Empty chamber, telling signal

Empty chamber, telling signal | Daily Tribune

The optics were unmistakable. Less than a month after Senate President Alan Peter Cayetano unseated Senator Vicente Sotto III in a coup that commanded only a thin majority of thirteen votes, the institution he now leads failed to receive a visiting head of state.

Whether Hanoi’s decision was a deliberate diplomatic signal or a simple act of prudence in the face of institutional uncertainty, the optics could not be worse for the Philippine Senate.

Foreign governments, by training and temperament, thrive on reliability. When a diplomatic protocol is arranged — particularly one tied to a milestone as significant as the 50th anniversary of Philippines-Vietnam relations — it is only withdrawn when the host institution’s standing turns genuinely doubtful.

That a state guest proceeded to Malacañang, and then canceled a set schedule to the Senate to avoid sitting across from legislators locked in an internal power struggle, is not a minor embarrassment. It is a statement about the Senate leadership’s credibility as a stable counterpart in formal diplomacy.

The international perception of Philippine legislators has, for years, oscillated between bemused skepticism and quiet concern. Privilege speeches that descend into personal invectives, Senate hearings that turn into political theater rather than legislative oversight, and leadership arrangements that hinge on shifting personal loyalties rather than principled coalition building — all of these contribute to an image of an institution that prioritizes political survival over institutional integrity.

The events of the recent weeks have done little to revise that impression.

For foreign investors, who monitor political risk with as much diligence as they monitor interest rates and infrastructure capacity, the Senate’s instability is not merely a domestic inconvenience.

Legislation governing critical sectors — energy, telecommunications, foreign equity, land use — is coursed through that chamber.

An upper house prone to sudden realignments, where a slim majority can overturn a leadership, triggering a realignment of policy positions, brings a layer of uncertainty that makes foreigners unaccustomed to such erratic behavior in institutions like the Philippine Senate, uncomfortable, to say the least.

When a visiting Vietnamese president declines to engage with that body, the signal to the international business community is that even a friendly neighboring government finds the Philippine Senate unreliable.

This comes at a time when the Philippines is actively courting foreign direct investment, positioning itself as a regional manufacturing alternative and a beneficiary of supply chain diversification.

The country has made strides in projecting policy continuity and regulatory reform, and President Lam’s bilateral talks at Malacañang had proceeded on a constructive and forward-looking note.

The Enhanced Strategic Partnership announced between the two countries reflects a genuine diplomatic effort.

But no amount of executive goodwill can compensate for a legislature that undermines the country’s image when it turns its internal conflicts into a public spectacle.

The Philippine Senate has, across its history, produced legislators of genuine distinction — men and women whose intellectual rigor, moral seriousness and legislative craft have earned them respect well beyond these shores. The chamber is now capable of better.

The question is whether its current membership has the institutional self-awareness to recognize that governance is not only about who holds the Senate presidency, but about what kind of Senate it chooses to project to the world.

Judging by what transpired on 1 June, the answer remains, at best, uncertain.