By Danilo P. Padua, PhD
June 11, 2025 was an ignominious day for the Philippine senate. The scenario in the senate was almost like the funny caricature of the late Larry Alcala in the moribund Pilipino komiks.
The day was supposed to be the start of the court proceedings to deal with the impeachment complaint against VP Sara D. There was a live streaming of the proceedings, so like many of us, Filipinos, I was glued to it.
It was a day when most of the senator-judges, resplendent in their colorful robes, appear to have been hit simultaneously by an unseen, malevolent force making them in a temporary state of stupor even before they wore their robes. Robes on, they seem honorable and respectable in contrast to how they conducted themselves in the supposed august hall of the upper house.
A lot of reactions from the public have flooded the various media platforms since then-from ordinary kibitzers up to the academics, lawyers, political analysts, constitutional experts, and even retired justices of the Supreme Court. Let’s leave those to them. Let us concentrate on what we saw.
Many senators made themselves instant comedians. Some of them had the audacity to make a motion to dismiss the impeachment complaint outright without the benefit of any hearing exposing their utter ignorance of their own court rules, and what their role is in the history-making event. They did not do their homework.
Others showed probably rehearsed actions, and pre-meditated motion that was disguised as a compromise between two contending sides. Methinks it was scripted? One of them clearly prodded senator Imee M.(it became viral in soc med shortly after) to make a motion to cut short the peroration of Sen. Risa H. The dutiful Imee did, on cue.
Certainly, those were not honorable acts.
SP Chiz Escudero declared a 15-minute break so, the senator-judges could put on their elegant robes. I decided to note down how long the senators will get back to the session hall. Within 3 minutes Senators Jinggoy and Nancy were already back to the hall, even making fun of each other. In another 2-4 min Senators Bato and Tolentino were also out donning their robes. Most of them were already at the hall 16 minutes after the declaration of recess.
True to themselves, senators Cynthia Villar, Imee Marcos and Robin Padilla, never wore their robes, giving their flimsy alibis shortly later. A day later, Imee and Robin followed VP Sara in Kuala Lumpur, panting like a dutiful dog, to meet with OFWs there during an Independence day program., There, Ms. Marcos admitted that the three of them were pasaway.
The three are giving the wrong signal to us, the citizens, that it is okay to defy rules or regulations if you don’t want it. Shades of their idols!
The senate agreed to remand the impeachment complaint to the Lower House, via an 18-5 votes. When such decision was challenged as to its legality, SP Escudero declared that the Lower House should just obey the order of the impeachment court, adding that only the SC can decide the legality of things. Yet, the decision to remand was due to what they perceived as constitutional infirmities, arrogating unto themselves the authority of the SC? It’s double talk.
They can not even make their three colleagues toe the line in the simple task of robe wearing.
The senators’ actions, the seemingly scripted scenarios, the misplaced motions, and those being pasaway, among others have corroded the respectability of the Senate bespeaks of biased mindset of the supposed to be impartial judges. One of them even boasted that if his body will be burned, it will smell like Duterte! Are they telling us that there is nothing honorable anymore in the senate?
It would be nice to remind the truant senators about the sagacious statement of former Pres. M.L. Quezon, “My loyalty to my party ends where my loyalty to my country begins”. Quezon was talking of a broader body. In the present case, it is about loyalty only to one family. There is no loyalty even to a party, and worse, no loyalty to the country or to its constitution.
Hail to the vaunted five for their principled stand: Senators Koko Pimentel, Risa Hontiveros, Nancy Binay, Grace Poe and Sherwin Gatchalian
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