Senator Alan Peter Cayetano carries a padlock. Not a real one — it's a philosophy. When democratic processes don't give him what he wants, he tries to lock down the institution.
On June 3, a new Senate majority voted to reorganize committees and elect Senator Sherwin Gatchalian as Senate President Pro Tempore and Acting Senate President. Cayetano was out. That's how democracy works: majorities organize, minorities accept and fight another day.
Cayetano didn't accept. He declared the proceedings illegitimate and launched what one commentator called an insurgency in slow motion.
The most brazen move came June 4. Cayetano's rump faction convened a so-called blue ribbon committee hearing. Eighteen supposed ex-soldiers — who said they worked as bodyguards for former representative Zaldy Co — were paraded before cameras. They made sweeping accusations against figures critical of the Cayetano-Duterte political alignment: members of the Marcos family, Senators Erwin Tulfo and Tito Sotto, ICC prosecutors, and assorted opposition figures. The witnesses claimed these people received luggage filled with cash — the infamous "malitas" — which the ex-soldiers said they personally delivered.
The inconsistencies were glaring. Social media erupted in memes and biting commentary. This wasn't an official investigation. It was a press conference dressed up as a hearing, with coached witnesses making accusations too sweeping and too conveniently targeted to be credible.
Since his removal, Cayetano has issued memos to Senate employees that no one follows. He has chided Gatchalian as a fake leader, then weakened his own claim by offering a responsibility-sharing deal that was flatly rejected. His designation as Senate President has been removed from the official website. The House impeachment team and the multi-agency group preparing for the State of the Nation Address are all dealing with Gatchalian.
Cayetano is using the Senate's institutional trappings — its session hall, committee names, procedural vocabulary — to conduct a wrecking operation. He isn't trying to participate. He's trying to make the chamber ungovernable for everyone else, or at least to muddy the waters so the public can't tell a legitimate proceeding from a political sideshow.
With the impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte set to convene, the desperation behind his moves is unmistakable. His actions constitute institutional sabotage with a single goal: to protect the Dutertes.
The padlock instinct runs in the family. His wife, Taguig Mayor Lani Cayetano, was charged before the Sandiganbayan for preventing City Council members from holding regular sessions. She shut down the session hall with a literal padlock, without proper notice or reason.
This isn't the first time Alan Peter Cayetano has pulled such a stunt. In October 2020, when his term-sharing deal with then-Marinduque representative Lord Allan Velasco came due, Cayetano reneged. He held the 2021 national budget hostage. When it became clear that his patron, then-president Rodrigo Duterte, was displeased and Velasco had the numbers, Cayetano tried to prevent his ouster by physically locking down the plenary hall. He was ousted anyway.
"The padlock is his legacy," wrote Joey Salgado, a former journalist and government communications practitioner who served as spokesperson for former vice president Jejomar Binay.
Cayetano has now lost the speakership and the Senate presidency through the same combination of overreach, arrogance, duplicity, and contempt for majority rule. History won't be kind to him, and he continues to give history no reason to judge him otherwise.