Nine senators allied with Alan Peter Cayetano asked the Supreme Court on June 16 to declare null and void the June 3 session that ousted him as Senate President — a day before President Marcos convened Congress to a special session the rival bloc intends to use to cement Sherwin Gatchalian's leadership.
MANILA — The Senate bloc led by Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano brought the chamber's five-week leadership war to the Supreme Court on Tuesday, June 16, filing a 97-page petition that asks the justices to void the June 3 session in which 12 senators declared all leadership posts vacant and installed Sen. Sherwin "Win" Gatchalian as Acting Senate President. The filing landed one day before President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. convened Congress in a special session that the Gatchalian majority says it will use to formally reorganize the Senate — raising the prospect of a collision between the judiciary and the legislature over who legitimately leads the upper house.
According to Philstar.com, the petitioners — filing through the court's e-filing system — asked the high court to order Gatchalian and the senators who took over committee chairmanships to "immediately cease and desist" from exercising any function derived from the June 3 proceedings, and to bar the enforcement of any measure approved that day. They also sought the restoration of Cayetano as Senate President, Loren Legarda as Senate President Pro Tempore, and Jose Luis Montales as Senate Secretary.
"By engineering the ouster of the sitting Senate President and installing a successor favored by the Executive Branch — all during a session that conspicuously lacked the requisite legal quorum — a breakaway legislative bloc has not only subverted internal parliamentary rules but has struck a dangerous blow against the institutional integrity of the Senate and the bedrock constitutional principle of separation of powers," the petition read, as quoted by Philstar Life.
The bloc argued the June 3 "rump session" and "all actions arising from it" were attended by "grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction" and were therefore void for violating Sections 16(1), 16(2) and 16(3) of Article VI of the 1987 Constitution. "Petitioner Senator Alan Cayetano thus remains Senate President," the filing asserted.
Per Philstar.com, the petitioners are Cayetano, Legarda, Pia Cayetano, Christopher "Bong" Go, Rodante Marcoleta, Imee Marcos, Robin Padilla, Camille Villar, and Jinggoy Estrada — the last of whom is detained on a plunder charge tied to the flood control scandal. Notably absent from the petition were Sens. Mark Villar, Ronald "Bato" dela Rosa, and Joel Villanueva. Villanueva, widely seen as a potential swing vote, said on June 15 that he would attend the special session if Marcos called one.
The Gatchalian bloc has defended the June 3 takeover by citing a 2015 Senate precedent and the 1949 Supreme Court ruling in Avelino v. Cuenco, which held that a quorum is determined by the number of senators within the country's jurisdiction. The chamber declared a quorum on June 3 after the appearance of Sen. Francis "Chiz" Escudero, then proceeded to vacate all elective positions and elect Gatchalian, with Sen. Juan Miguel Zubiri as Majority Leader.
Senate Majority figures dismissed the petition as a delaying tactic. According to BusinessMirror, Sen. Panfilo Lacson characterized Cayetano's resort to the Supreme Court as "yet another bid to disrupt the work of Congress." Malacañang and the House of Representatives have both recognized the Gatchalian-led leadership.
The petition arrived as Cayetano's bloc pressed ahead with an off-site Blue Ribbon Committee hearing on flood control anomalies, chaired by Sen. Pia Cayetano. Philstar.com reported that the original Mandaluyong City venue cancelled the booking, though the gathering proceeded elsewhere — and that in a separate June 17 report, the offsite "Blue Ribbon hearing" drew few senators.
Context
The standoff dates to early June, when Cayetano and his allies boycotted sessions to protest the arrest of Sen. Jinggoy Estrada on a non-bailable plunder charge connected to the multibillion-peso flood control kickback scandal. The boycott stalled proceedings until the Gatchalian bloc mustered a quorum on June 3 and reorganized the chamber over Cayetano's objection that the move was an "illegal coup d'état."
The Supreme Court has so far declined to wade in. On June 10, it dismissed a separate petition filed by a high school teacher seeking to validate the Gatchalian session, ruling the petitioner lacked legal standing — leaving the leadership contest unresolved by the judiciary. The Cayetano bloc's petition, filed by sitting senators with a direct stake, presents the court with a standing question it cannot as easily sidestep.
The leadership fight also carries stakes for the impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte, set to begin July 6, since the Senate sits as the impeachment court and its presiding officer's legitimacy could be challenged. As of posting, the Supreme Court had not acted on the petition or issued any restraining order, and the special session was set to convene June 17 with the leadership question still formally unsettled.
Sources
- Ian Laqui, "Cayetano bloc brings Senate row to Supreme Court, seeks voiding of June 3 session," Philstar.com, June 16, 2026 — https://www.philstar.com/headlines/2026/06/16/2535632/cayetano-bloc-brings-senate-row-supreme-court-seeks-voiding-june-3-session
- Melanie Uson, "Alan Cayetano, allies ask SC to nullify Gatchalian-led June 3 Senate session," Philstar Life, June 16, 2026 — https://philstarlife.com/news-and-views/450019-alan-cayetano-allies-ask-sc-to-nullify-gatchalian-led-june-3-senate-session
- "Cayetano's SC petition yet another bid to disrupt the work of Congress – Lacson," BusinessMirror, June 16, 2026 — https://businessmirror.com.ph/2026/06/16/cayetanos-sc-petition-yet-another-bid-to-disrupt-the-work-of-congress-lacson/
- Alexis Romero, "Marcos calls for Congress special session on June 17," Philstar.com, June 16, 2026 — https://www.philstar.com/headlines/2026/06/16/2535504/marcos-calls-congress-special-session-june-17
- "Special session today to formally reorganize Senate," Philstar.com, June 17, 2026 — https://www.philstar.com/headlines/2026/06/17/2535791/special-session-today-formally-reorganize-senate