The level of discussion inside the Senate has sunk into personal attacks and shallow exchanges, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. said, drawing a sharp contrast with the chamber he once served in as a senator.
Marcos pointed to the contrast in how senators conducted themselves during his own time in the chamber. Policy fights happened, he said, but they rarely spilled into personal hostility, and lawmakers who clashed over legislation still kept up ordinary working relationships afterward.
“Merong mga senador na pag nag-uusap sa trabaho, di kami nag-aagree talaga. Pero after pag-upo namin, magkakape kami, kakain kami nang sabay. Hindi personal. Nagbago na,” he said.
That shift, in his telling, is what troubles him most about the institution’s present condition.
“Yung Senado, di na gaya nung panahon natin. Nagpe-personalan na. Ang babaw na ng usapan,” the President said.
His remarks, delivered to Manila-based reporters during his trip to Tokyo, also touched on the gunfire incident at the Senate that drew national attention. Marcos brushed aside the episode as “fake” but offered no further detail on what he meant.
The President framed his disappointment in stark terms as he described watching the chamber’s standing erode.
“I watch with horror that the Senate has become this,” he said.
He went further, saying the chamber’s current trajectory was something he had not anticipated when he sat as a member.
“I never imagined that the Senate would descend into this kind of what is happening right now,” Marcos said.
