If there is anything positive to come out of the impeachment case filed against Vice President Sara Duterte, it is the virtual confirmation that President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. is no longer president.

A day after the impeachment case was filed, Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin issued a statement saying that “(t)he Office of the President has nothing to do with it.”

“(The complaint) is clearly the complainants’ independent initiative, and its endorsement the prerogative of any Member of the House of Representatives,” Bersamin said.

For a moment, we are tempted to imagine ourselves in a sovereign state where the Constitution is upheld at all times and the law is supreme. Of course, we all know the real score.

Until this point, some people still believed that BBM was still president. That fantasy evaporated when he washed his hands of the impeachment complaint that he dismissed as “a waste of time” just a few days earlier.

It is nothing like the decisive and categorical rejection of former President Rodrigo Duterte to suggestions of former Vice President Leni Robredo. Comparing BBM to FPRRD, of course, is pointless. But that would digress from the issue at hand.

For the impeachment complaint to reach first base is a testament to BBM’s frailty and insincerity. Even the most vociferous of his critics — as the people behind the case once were — would think twice before proceeding with it under one who is firm. As to sincerity, well, BBM must have been somewhere else when it was being distributed.

To be fair, BBM can be firm and decisive if he wants to. The manner by which the Hakbang ng Maisug rallies were brutally and unceremoniously harassed is proof of that. Lest anyone forget, he is not Ferdinand Marcos Jr. for nothing.

Early in his term, BBM unleashed his first-degree cousin, Speaker Martin Romualdez, obviously to groom him as successor. If his father’s reign is the template, Romualdez fits the bill. Romualdez comes with a lot of baggage—literal and figurative—but who cares? One cannot choose relatives, so BBM is stuck with him—for better or for worse (mostly for worse).

That settled, Romualdez sets into motion the grand design for his succession. Mustering all the resources at his disposal (and even those that were not his for the taking), Martin didn’t waste time.

There’s just one problem though — a major problem that goes by the name of Inday Sara Duterte.

To remove her from the equation, they waged a consistent propaganda campaign against her in the mainstream media. They accused her of misusing the confidential fund and even included her in the cases before the ICC.

When all these failed, they resorted to the filing of the impeachment case against her. There is no argument that Martin’s fingerprints are all over, but this is only because BBM surrendered the wheel of governance to him ahead of 2028.

Unfortunately for BBM and Martin, the Filipinos' fabled patience has snapped. The army of trolls employed to sow disinformation is no match for a people who have tasted good governance under FPRRD. They are the ones fighting back even as VP Inday and the Dutertes continue to keep their distance while parrying blows rained on them by Martin and BBM.

Legal minds have dismissed the impeachment case, at best, as a botched job, the result of the haste with which it was prepared. It has no leg to stand on, but enough to satisfy the mounting pressure from administration allies getting uncomfortable with the delay.

If they thought the impeachment would rattle VP Inday, FPRRD, and their allies, they were wrong. The worst thing that can happen is for her to be impeached, which she looks forward to because it will free her from the pressures that come with the expectations of her own date with destiny.

Her legions of supporters, however, would not allow that to happen. They and the country, not her, stand to lose most under Martin. That is what BBM and Martin would have to deal with.

BBM's decision to wash his hands of the impeachment is immaterial. With his virtual admission that he has lost control over his administration, BBM has only raised the temperature to a level of uncertainty reminiscent of his father's last days in Malacañang.

Hand-washing did not work for Pilate. It won’t work for BBM.