Comelec, Sotto push party-list system reforms

MANILA, Philippines — Election officials and Senate President Vicente Sotto III are pushing for sweeping reforms to the party-list system to eliminate loopholes that allow traditional politicians to hijack seats meant for marginalized sectors through nominee substitutions.

At yesterday’s Senate electoral reforms committee hearing, Commission on Elections (Comelec) Chairman George Garcia urged lawmakers to pass strict legislation governing the substitution of party-list nominees, revealing how groups exploit the current rules.

Some groups secure accreditation by submitting a list of legitimate sectoral representatives, such as the urban poor, only to have all winning nominees simultaneously resign after the election, he explained.

Despite prevailing jurisprudence that compels the Comelec to accept new lists if a winning party exhausts its nominees, Garcia said the body took a “bold step” by capping the nominee list to 10 and administratively barring substitutions in cases of withdrawal.

Garcia, however, admitted this rests on shaky legal ground without a clear law.

He appealed Congress to permanently legislate guardrails on substitutions.

Ban political parties

Sotto, whose bill takes a hardline stance on party-list reform, questioned why major political parties are allowed to participate in a system originally designed for the underrepresented.

“Are political parties marginalized? How can they be marginalized if there’s a lot of them in the Senate, House, provincial board, city council… How are they marginalized?” he asked.

Sotto is pushing to revert the system to its original intent, limiting participation strictly to defined marginalized sectors: labor, peasants, farmers, fisherfolk, urban poor, indigenous peoples, elderly, persons with disability, women and youth.