Senator Imee Marcos on Monday denied reports linking her to the failed coup attempt against Senate President Tito Sotto, stressing that the move to take a key committee chairmanship from her had nothing to do with the alleged shakeup.

In fact, the opposition solon said, she was “one of the later holdouts,” among the last to join the move to oust Sotto, which her fellow minority members could attest to.

“What propelled the ‘coup’ was a general sense, even among majority members, that the Senate was being targeted in the various flood and infra investigations, and the senators could no longer rely on the institution to protect or defend them,” Marcos said.

Marcos was recently replaced as chair of the Committee on Foreign Relations by Senator Erwin Tulfo, a member of the majority bloc.

The transition came on the heels of the escalating verbal row between senators and the Chinese embassy over the ongoing territorial dispute in the West Philippine Sea. The sharp exchanges prompted the Senate to issue a resolution denouncing Beijing’s indecent remarks made against Philippine officials, with Sotto floating a proposal to declare China’s envoy persona non grata.

Marcos was among the nine minority senators who did not sign the resolution, though she filed a separate one urging restraint to “avoid the unnecessary escalation of diplomatic tensions.”

Sotto, who narrowly survived the coup attempt, claimed that Marcos’s removal further triggered efforts to unseat him.

Marcos, however, denied harboring any ill feelings toward Sotto, saying that she was actually grateful that he had allowed her to chair the committee — traditionally held by the majority — even though she was a member of the minority.

Marcos also noted that as a vocal critic of the administration of her brother, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., she didn’t expect any special treatment — especially when it came to internal Senate politics.

“I expect a common statement from the minority to be forthcoming, and hope that in the [meantime], I am no longer blamed for being the ‘coup instigator,’” she said.

Sotto, on the other hand, declined to comment on the issue.

Talk of a Senate coup had made the headlines since last week amid speculation that the minority would install Senator Loren Legarda in favor of Sotto to halt the impending approval of the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee report.

The report, leaked to the media last week, recommends the filing of corruption charges against Senators Jinggoy Estrada and Joel Villanueva, who are accused of taking kickbacks in flood control projects.

Amid the supposed shakeup on Wednesday, 4 February, Senators Marcos and Estrada were spotted leaving Legarda’s office, sparking speculation that the minority bloc was trying to court her to unseat Sotto as Senate president.

Sotto averred that a “term sharing” with Legarda was unnecessary, as he had already agreed to relinquish the post pursuant to the consensus reached by the majority to make Legarda the “first woman Senate president,” but only in 2028.