Constitution lawyers agree that the First Party rule will make future party-list elections vicious and expensive and is against the spirit of the party-list system.
BY DABET CASTAÑEDA
ELECTION WATCH
Bulatlat
Vol. VII, No. 19, June 17-23, 2007
The First Party rule, other wise known as the Panganiban formula (named after former Chief Justice Artemio Panaganiban who came up with this formula), will only destroy the party-list system in the country, lawyers said in a forum June 12.
The said rule allows only the first party to get three seats (the most number of seats a party-list group could hold in one term according to the three-seat cap) while the rest of the party list groups will only get two seats at the most. In the last three elections (1998, 2001 and 2004), the Commission on Elections (Comelec) used the Simplified Formula (2-4-6 percent) which allows all parties that gathered two percent of the total party list votes to get one seat, those who get four percent will hold two seats while those that get six percent holds three seats.
Neri Colmenares, general counsel and third nominee of the party-list group Bayan Muna (people first), said the First Party Rule violates the basic concept of the party-list system which is to represent the marginalized and the underrepresented.
This is ironic, Colmenares said, because the party-list system is supposed to be an indictment of Congress. “When the Constitution says that the party-list system is for the marginalized and the underrepresented, this means that for a long period of time, Congress has failed to represent various sectors of society,” he said.
Now, Colmenares said the implementation of the First Party Rule further endangers the representation of the underprivileged sectors of society in the Lower House.
Implications
The Panganiban formula, said Colmenares, pins the hopes of all party-list groups in the fortunes of the leading party. “Instead of focusing on their platform, the parties might divert their campaign in pulling down the first party,” Colmenares explained. This creates a “divide and rule” situation among the party-list groups, the lawyer further said.
The First Party rule will also require more resources for a party-list group to win in the elections. The rule requires the remaining party-list groups to have at least half of the votes of the first party to assure itself of another seat in the Lower House. “This will make the party-list elections vicious and expensive,” Colmenares said.
Political persecution
But the “grand plan” for implementing the First Party rule is to “disseminate party-list groups,” Colmenares said “This is political persecution,” he said.
“This is the Macapagal-Arroyo administration’s way of getting us out of Congress after we won in spite of the harassments and fraud directed against us,” Colmenares said.
Members and officers of progressive party-list groups such as Bayan Muna, Anakpawis (toiling masses), Gabriela Women’s Party, Kabataan (Youth) and Suara Bangsamoro have been targets of political killings, harassments and enforced disappearances with the attacks intensifying in the last three years.
During the election period from January 14 to June 13, six Bayan Muna members and two from Kabataan party-list were killed, and one was abducted from Bayan Muna. Bayan Muna is also the single organization with the most number of members and leaders killed in the tally of political killings by Karapatan.
Unconstitutional
In the same forum, Kabataan Party-list legal counsel Robert Coscico said that even with the three-seat cap there is already a problem. And that this will be made worse by the impending implementation of the Panganiban formula.
In his Supreme Court ruling, Panganiban stated that “each qualified party, regardless of the number of votes it actually obtained, is entitled to a maximum of three seats; that is one ‘qualifying’ and two additional seats.”
Panganiban also stated that the “combined number of party-list representatives shall not exceed twenty percent of the total membership of the House of Representatives, including those elected under the party list.”
Cosico said the problem lies in using the word “shall” instead of making the twenty percent allocation “mandatory.”
“There is no law requiring Congress to fill in the seats allocated to party-list representatives,” Cosico said.
By using the First Party rule formula for this election, the total number of seats to be held by party-list representatives is only 20. With 212 as the total number of seats for the 14th Congress, the correct number of party-list representatives should be 53.
“So what happens now with the other 33 seats? Sayang na lang, hindi na mapupunan,” (It’s a pity that it won’t be filled up.) Cosico said.
The formula stated in the Constitution is 4:1 (four district representatives for every one party-list representative). “Therefore, if the resulting ratio is not proportional, it is unconstitutional,” Cosico says.(Bulatlat.com)
