CARTOON BY: AARON PAUL C. CARIL
EDITORIAL
The State of Accountability
When President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. delivers his fifth State of the Nation Address on July 27, he will not be speaking in a political vacuum. His address will land in the middle of the impeachment storm involving Vice President Sara Duterte, making the SONA less a report card and more a test of consistency. If the President invokes accountability, the public will immediately ask: accountability for whom, by whom, and under what rules? The impeachment has become the mirror beside the podium, reflecting whether reform is a principle or merely a weapon pointed at a former ally.
The figures give the speech a difficult backdrop. The Philippine Statistics Authority placed June 2026 inflation at 6.4 percent, with food, housing, utilities, and transport among the continuing pressures. First-quarter growth was reported at 2.8 percent, while unemployment in May covered 2.498 million Filipinos. Government debt stood at about ₱18.55 trillion as of May. These are not partisan descriptions; they are official numbers. They explain why many citizens will listen less for grand phrasing than for credible answers on prices, jobs, services, and fiscal discipline.
Corruption remains the issue that weakens every promise. Transparency International’s 2025 Corruption Perceptions Index gave the Philippines a score of 32 out of 100 and ranked it 120th among 182 countries, below both the global and Asia-Pacific averages. The controversy over flood-control projects has further sharpened public concern, with billions in public funds linked to substandard, questionable, or allegedly nonexistent works and with graft and plunder complaints filed against officials, contractors, and political figures. For communities that still flood after every hard rain, the matter is not abstract governance; it is public money that failed to become public protection.
That is why the impeachment cannot be treated as a side story to the SONA; it is the speech’s sharpest credibility test. The allegations against the Vice President are grave: misuse of confidential funds, unexplained wealth, bribery and procurement irregularities, and alleged threats against the President, the First Lady, and a former House Speaker. The Senate impeachment court has moved on subpoenas related to witnesses and records involving the alleged misuse of ₱612.5 million in confidential funds. But a grave accusation does not excuse a careless process. If the administration presents the impeachment as proof of clean governance, it must also prove that the case is driven by evidence and constitutional duty, not by the collapse of a political partnership.
The country therefore has every reason to be critical of the impeachment even while taking the charges seriously. The Supreme Court’s ruling against the earlier impeachment, citing the one-year bar rule and due process, should have been a warning that zeal is not a substitute for legality. The new case may proceed, but it still carries the burden of political context: the Marcos-Duterte alliance has split, 2028 is already casting its shadow, and Congress is hardly an innocent altar of constitutional virtue. If impeachment becomes the administration’s centerpiece of accountability while other scandals remain slow-moving or conveniently untouched, it will look less like justice and more like succession management.
This is the question the SONA cannot avoid. The President may speak of reform, but the impeachment will supply the footnote to every line. If accountability is real, it must move beyond one estranged running mate and reach flood-control anomalies, allies accused of benefiting from public works, agencies that fail audits, and institutions that act only when the target has become politically disposable. The SONA must not turn impeachment into a trophy. It must explain why the same standard will apply to friends, enemies, and everyone in between; otherwise, the state of the nation will sound less like accountability and more like selective prosecution with better lighting.