Cayetano slams Palace readiness for special session

MANILA, Philippines — Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano accused Malacañang of trying to control the Senate in its readiness to call Congress to a special session to make up for the legislative work affected by his bloc’s boycott from June 1 to 3.

Cayetano held a one-hour press briefing after attending Thursday’s “Blue Ribbon hearing” on the allegations of the “18 ex-Marines,” as he maintained that he is still the Senate president despite the post being declared vacant before Wednesday’s sine die adjournment by the new 12-member majority.

Asked about President Marcos’ willingness to heed the new majority’s call for a special session, Cayetano said: “Let me ask Malacañang. What’s more important to you, power or order?”

“A Senate controlled by Malacañang is not a true Senate,” Cayetano added in Filipino.

Under Article VI of the 1987 Constitution, the President is authorized to “call a special session at any time.”

Cayetano defended his leadership from May 11 of the Senate, which has since erupted in turbulence, starting with the surprise appearance of fugitive Sen. Ronald dela Rosa after six months of hiding to join Cayetano’s coup against then Senate president Vicente Sotto III, and the gunfire triggered on May 13 by suspended Senate sergeant-at-arms Mao Aplasca, allegedly to serve as cover for Dela Rosa to leave the Senate and evade arrest.

He denied the Senate had been chaotic under his watch, if that was the reason for Malacañang to try to “control” the Senate.

“If you want to call a special session just to consolidate your power, most of our countrymen have already lost their trust. It’s because there’s always chaos happening in our country. You may have been entertained by the Senate, but it’s not even the Senate that’s chaotic,” Cayetano said, citing the country’s other issues.

“They have all the power, they have all the money, they have all the influence. I’m not at par… They have all the power. What we have is the truth,” he added.

Cayetano stood by his leadership post, saying the new 12-member majority, led by “acting Senate President” Sherwin Gatchalian, still lacked the required 13 votes to elect a new Senate president to replace him, and that their 12-senator quorum was invalid.

“Senator Win wants to be Senate president; he’s exercising all kinds of immaturity to our democracy. He’ll allow only 12? He’ll accept ‘acting SP?’” Cayetano said. “I will assert my authority, legitimacy as Senate president.”

Asked if his bloc of 10 allies so far – minus international fugitive Dela Rosa and detained plunder suspect Sen. Jinggoy Estrada – would attend the special session, Cayetano said the Senate may not need their attendance any more if the Gatchalian bloc gets more than 12 members to its side.

“I’m not sure. It depends,” he said when asked if they would attend.

“What do they intend to do? We reserve the right to use every parliamentary tool that is available to fight for what we have,” Cayetano said, hinting that he is willing to continue his session boycotts that stalled the Senate’s legislative work this week.

Short of one vote, the “Solid Bloc” new majority of 12 took advantage of the Cayetano bloc’s absence in the last session to wrest control of the floor after Sen. Francis Escudero broke ranks with Cayetano and attended the session.

Gatchalian had cited the Avelino vs. Cuenco doctrine, that their quorum of 12 is valid because two senators – Estrada and Dela Rosa – are outside the chamber’s “coercive reach” to compel their attendance, making 12 the quorum of 22 senators.

Gatchalian and Sotto said a quorum of 12 has been done in the Senate in the past, especially during the second regular session of the 16th Congress in 2015 when three of its members – Estrada, Ramon Revilla Jr. and the late Juan Ponce Enrile – had been detained for plunder over the pork barrel scam.

Senate journals showed that quorum had been declared with only 12 of 24 senators present, thus debunking the Cayetano bloc’s argument of “When did 12=13?”

On May 5, 2015, quorum was declared with 12 senators present, because four senators were out of the country on official mission and three senators were detained at the time, and thus “were not counted in the determination of a quorum pursuant to the decision of the Supreme Court,” the Senate Journal Session 69 read.

On June 2, 2015, quorum was also declared with 12 senators present, with three senators abroad and three under detention.

Legal experts back quorum of 12

Law deans, professors of juridical science and political theorists backed the quorum of 12 senators that reconstituted the Senate and elected Gatchalian as president pro tempore.

In a statement signed by 28 experts – led by retired justice and San Beda University Graduate School of Law professor Adolfo Azcuna – they said that while 24 senators were elected, one of them, Dela Rosa, has been in hiding and his whereabouts unknown.

“Since 12 of 23 senators have decided that Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian is President Pro-Tempore of the Senate, then certainly there is no way that one who can count on only 11 votes in his support – including his own – can continue to assert his leadership over a body, majority of whose members have repudiated him,” the signatories said.

The law experts and political theorists added that to insist Dela Rosa should be counted in determining a majority, for purposes of quorum, is “to accord someone who is evading arrest and the processes of law, and deliberately putting himself beyond the reach of any legal coercion, the power to hold the entire legislature hostage.”

“It is a choice between insistence on numbers over the functioning of the legislative branch of government. Certainly, it could not have been the intent of the framers of the Constitution to give any member, either of the House of Representatives or the Senate, the power to cause a deadlock that makes all legislative business impossible. Then, of course, there is the fact that Sen. Jinggoy Estrada is currently under detention and is factually unable to participate in the proceedings of the Senate,” the law deans, professors and political theorists added.

The signatories added that Article VI, Section 16, paragraph 2 of the 1987 Constitution defines a quorum as “a majority of each House” for the purpose of doing business.

“Even without addressing the question of the election of a Senate president, what this pronouncement of the Supreme Court calls attention to is its sensitivity to political realities – and the political reality is that 12 chose to appear to discharge their duties as senators, while 11 chose to stay away, shirking from their bounden duty,” the 28 signatories noted.

Other signatories of the manifesto included Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas; University of the Philippines College of Law former dean Pacifico Agabin; San Beda University Graduate School of Law Dean Fr. Ranhilio Callangan Aquino; University of Asia and the Pacific Law School Dean Jemy Gatdula; San Beda University Graduate School of Law professor Edmund Tayao; Ateneo de Manila University School of Governance former dean Antonio La Viña; Adamson University College of Law Dean Anna Maria Abad; Lyceum of the Philippines University College of Law Dean Ma Soledad Deriquito-Mawis. ?

IBP: Up to Senate to amend rules

When asked about the possibility of senators approving a proposal for some members to attend its sessions through teleconference, Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP) national president Allan Panolong said the move was “within their power because that forms part of their internal rules.”

“The Senate, within its power, can propose for its own internal rules, and since they already have internal rules then they have the power also to amend it,” Panolong said over dzBB yesterday.

However, Panolong warned the idea of amending the Senate rules “just to accommodate one person” could go to waste.

Meanwhile, former Senate presidents have issued a joint statement urging senators to resolve the “Senate brouhaha” and for a Senate chief not to cling to power, a subtle swipe at Cayetano.

“We, former presidents of the Senate of the Republic of the Philippines, speak at this difficult moment out of our shared moral duty to the institution we once had the honor to lead,” read the statement issued by former Senate presidents and former senators Frank Drilon (2000; 2001-2006; 2013-2016) and Aquilino Pimentel III (2016-2018) and incumbent Solid Bloc senators Sotto (2018-2022; 2025-2026) and Juan Miguel Zubiri (2022-2024).

Missing from the list was Escudero (2024-2025), who broke the quorum impasse this week. — Bella Cariaso, Ghio Ong, Emmanuel Tupas