Just hours ago, 249 members of the House of Representatives voted to adopt the Ethics Committee’s recommendation to suspend Cavite 4th District Rep. Kiko Barzaga for 60 days—stripped of salary, stripped of allowances, and stripped, it seems, of the basic respect due to a member of Congress who dared to speak uncomfortable truths. Five lawmakers voted against the measure; eleven abstained. The numbers alone suggest what many now fear: that the lower chamber has become less a House of the People and more a House of Obedience.
Rep. Barzaga, known for his candor and refusal to swallow official narratives, stood against the former Speaker and even questioned the conduct of the President and the Majority Leader. For exercising the very mandate voters gave him—to speak, to expose, to challenge—the majority bloc has effectively silenced him for two months.
And here lies the disturbing part.
The Ethics Committee, by definition, is supposed to function as an impartial guardian of fairness—guided by principles such as autonomy, justice, beneficence, non-maleficence, confidentiality, and most of all, honesty. It exists to protect rights, not to police political loyalties.
So how does one reconcile the committee’s lofty mandate with its decision to punish a legislator whose “offense” was political dissent and the pursuit of truth?
How does one claim autonomy while penalizing independence?
How does one champion beneficence while punishing candor?
How does one speak of justice while rewarding silence and shielding power?
The Constitution guarantees freedom of speech, particularly for members of Congress participating in public debate. Legislative immunity exists not to protect wrongdoing, but to ensure lawmakers can expose wrongdoing without fear of retaliation. Yet here we are, watching an Ethics Committee—tasked with upholding integrity—make a decision that appears rooted less in ethics and more in political pressure.
If dissent is now “unethical,” then what becomes of accountability?
If truth-telling is now an offense, then what becomes of democracy?
If lawmakers are punished for speaking out, then what message is being sent to the Filipino people?
This suspension is more than a penalty.
It is a precedent.
It is a warning shot.
And it forces us to ask: Is the House disciplining one member—or intimidating the rest?
In a healthy democracy, ethics protects truth.
In a captured one, ethics becomes a weapon to silence it.
