I heard from so many Filipinos about the desire to dismantle the Senate as an institution; the majority of opinions hold that this hallowed institution has now become hollow, overripe for reconfiguration. I told these disappointed Filipinos that it would require a constitutional revision to do this.

Dismantling a two-chambered legislature has already been openly discussed. It is not new. This just revived itself naturally after the successive brouhahas exposed the Senate for what it has become.

For generations, the Philippine Senate was imagined as the nation’s “august chamber” — a stabilizing institution meant to temper passions, scrutinize laws, and embody the highest standards of public service. Today, however, that vision increasingly appears detached from reality. Under the leadership of Alan Peter Cayetano, the Senate has become a theater of elite maneuvering, political survivalism, and institutional decay.

The events surrounding last week’s shooting incident inside the Senate complex crystallized this decline. The public witnessed confusion, contradictory narratives, delayed disclosures, and a visibly disorganized institutional response. More alarming than the incident itself was the atmosphere surrounding it: an apparent unwillingness among allies in the majority bloc to demand transparency and accountability aggressively. Instead of projecting steadiness and command during a national embarrassment, Senate leadership projected hesitation, opacity, and political calculation.

Institutions do not collapse overnight. They decay gradually — through tolerated incompetence, normalized impunity, and the steady substitution of public duty with factional loyalty.

But the present disorder engulfing the Senate did not emerge in a vacuum. It is the predictable consequence of the growing dominance of political dynasties in Philippine governance. The Senate today increasingly resembles not a chamber of independent statesmen but a consortium of interlocking family enterprises that wield public office as inherited political capital.

The controversial ouster of Tito Sotto exposed this reality with unusual clarity. The decisive alignments that shifted the balance of power within the chamber prominently involved entrenched political clans: the Cayetano siblings, the Villar siblings, and factions connected to the Estrada political network. These were not isolated politicians acting purely as independent legislators guided by institutional considerations. They were members of enduring political houses whose calculations inevitably extend beyond Senate governance into the preservation of broader familial influence and business-political interests.

This is the deeper danger posed by dynastic politics. When legislative chambers become populated by interconnected clans, institutions become easier to destabilize from within. Loyalty shifts away from constitutional principles and toward familial alliances, political debts, and shared survival interests. In such an environment, the Senate ceases to function as a neutral democratic institution and instead becomes an arena for elite family competition.

In a genuinely non-dynastic political order, destabilizing the Senate would likely be far more difficult. Independent legislators without entrenched familial blocs would be compelled to negotiate primarily on policy, ideology, or institutional principle. But where dynasties dominate, coordinated political movements become easier to organize because networks of influence already exist across parties, business circles, local governments, and media infrastructures.

The modern Senate no longer consistently reflects the aspirations of ordinary Filipinos. It increasingly reflects the ambitions of political dynasties, celebrity politicians, entrenched oligarchic interests, and personalities who view public office less as stewardship and more as strategic protection. In theory, senators are elected nationally to represent the entire republic. In practice, many function as independent political warlords pursuing personal brands, family interests, and factional agendas.

This structural distortion explains why the Senate often appears disconnected from the hardships facing ordinary citizens. While inflation burdens households and public services deteriorate, Senate discourse frequently devolves into spectacle, obstruction, performative grandstanding, or partisan warfare. Legislative productivity becomes secondary to media visibility. National interest becomes subordinate to political leverage.

The conduct of several senators during the recent controversy reinforced a troubling perception: that institutional solidarity now matters more than public accountability. The reflex to contain damage rather than expose truth undermines the credibility not merely of individual senators, but of the Senate itself.

Historically, bicameral legislatures are justified as safeguards against tyranny. A second chamber is meant to refine legislation, restrain populist excesses, and provide institutional continuity. Yet these arguments weaken when the second chamber itself becomes captured by elite interests. Instead of acting as a check on power, the Senate increasingly functions as a shield for competing centers of power.

This is why proposals to radically reform — or even abolish — the Senate are no longer confined to fringe political discussions. More Filipinos are beginning to ask a once-unthinkable question: what exactly is the Senate protecting today? The republic, or the political class?

Critics of abolition argue that dismantling the Senate would weaken democratic safeguards. That concern deserves serious consideration. But defenders of the status quo must also confront a harder truth: institutions survive not because constitutions preserve them, but because public trust sustains them. Once trust collapses, institutional legitimacy erodes with it.

The deeper issue is not merely one Senate President or one incident. It is a governing culture that rewards visibility over competence, alliances over principles, and survival over accountability. Leadership failures expose institutional weaknesses already long embedded within the chamber itself.

The Filipino nation possesses values far richer than what the Senate currently projects. Filipinos value sacrifice, sincerity, discipline, family, faith, and communal responsibility. Yet the Senate increasingly projects opportunism, theatricality, dynastic entitlement, and political transactionalism. The disconnect is widening.

If the Senate wishes to preserve its existence, it must rediscover its purpose. It must again become a chamber of statesmanship rather than celebrity, of public duty rather than factional intrigue. Otherwise, calls for its eradication will only intensify — not because Filipinos oppose democracy, but because they increasingly believe the institution no longer serves democratic ends.

No institution is entitled to permanence. In a republic, every institution survives only so long as it retains the confidence of the people.

I believe that it is high time to revisit these suggestions, particularly on the relevance or irrelevance of the Senate as the second chamber of the House. Maybe, after they convict Vice President Sara Duterte for the crimes she committed, the people would then turn their attention to the Senate. The scandalous acts of the Senators over the past few days and weeks have significantly contributed to more negative views of our nation and of government among the international community. It is time for those who humiliate us in the global community to be held accountable as well.