Comelec vows to guard vs bogus party-list groups

MANILA, Philippines - The Commission on Elections (Comelec) assured the public yesteday that it will guard against bogus party-list groups in next year’s elections despite the “liberal” guidelines set by the Supreme Court (SC).

Comelec Chairman Andres Bautista said while they have to consider the “pronouncement of SC” on the qualifications of party-list groups, they would not allow fake ones to use the party-list system as a back door to Congress.

“When the Comelec divisions hold hearings, they will strictly look into the articles of incorporations, members and officials. We will spot bogus groups,” he said.

But Bautista admitted that because of the SC decision on the Atong Paglaum case in November 2012, the guidelines in screening the applications for party-list accreditation could not be as strict as before.

SC ruled that Republic Act 7941, the Party-List System Act, does not require parties, organizations and sectors to be marginalized and under-represented to be accredited as party-lists.

The high tribunal also declared that a party-list nominee need not belong to the sector, which the group wishes to represent in Congress. 

The decision was based on consolidated petitions filed by 54 groups disqualified by the Comelec for failure to show that they represented the marginalized sector, for lack of track records and for having nominees not belonging to the sector they seek to represent.

A total of 244 party-list organizations have manifested their intent to run in the May 2016 polls.

Currently, 58 seats at the House of Representatives are occupied by party-list group nominees, comprising 20 percent of the total membership.