KBL-PMM set to register as new coalition party

MANILA, Philippines – Two political parties will form a new coalition to be registered at the Commission on Elections (Comelec) to support Sen. Ferdinand Marcos Jr. if he joins the presidential race next year.

Joining forces to form the Pagkakaisa ng mga Pilipino para sa Pilipinas (PPP) are the Kilusang Bagong Lipunan (KBL) and the Partido ng Manggagawa at Magsasaka (PMM).

Vicente  Millora, KBL president, and Jose Malvar Villegas, PMM president, announced the formation of the coalition in separate interviews with The STAR yesterday.

The PPP will be the first political coalition party to be registered with the Comelec, Villegas said.

President Ferdinand Marcos founded the KBL in 1978, while the PMM was founded in 1963.

The PMM coalesced with Lakas Tao in 1992 to help Fidel Ramos win the presidential election, Villegas said.

The new PPP coalition will revive and mobilize the nationwide KBL political machinery that has been dormant in the past 30 years, Villegas said.

“In my consultations, original KBL party members including their supporters had expressed their desire to join the political battle they abandoned 30 years ago,” he said.

Lawyer Oliver Lozano, PPP legal counsel, will file the petition for registration before the Comelec tomorrow, Villegas said.

The KBL-PMM alliance earlier pushed for a Marcos-Duterte tandem to link  the solid North with voters of the Visayas and the Mindanao Christian, Muslim and tribal block.

The political agenda that the PPP coalition will present includes holding accountable the people responsible for the economic woes of the country today, Lozano said.