Party-list concept needs revisiting

Representative government is not a perfect system of government, and one of its salient imperfections is the elected representatives’ inability to accord priority to the needs and concerns of all those who elected them. As a result, some constituents consider themselves marginalized and calls begin to be made for steps to correct this systemic shortcoming.

The members of the commission created by then newly installed President Corazon Aquino to draft a new Constitution with the thought that they found the answer to the unattended-constituents problem in the party-list concept that had long been a part of the governmental systems of most western European countries. Under this concept a number of seats was made available in the legislature for candidates elected to represent sectors of society considered underrepresented or politically marginalized. Because of the expectation that the strength of the two or three major political parties would serve to keep the number of winning party-list candidates small, western European countries have not set an upper limit on the number of party-list members of their legislatures.

By contrast, there are limits in this country to the allowable number of party-list members of Congress. One limit relates to the number of votes that a party-list party must obtain in order to gain seats in Congress. A party-list party must win at least two percent of the total number of votes cast in the election to be able to seat one of its candidates. The number of admissible candidates rises proportionately with the excess over two percent. The Supreme Court had occasion to rule on this issue in the case filed against the Commission on Elections (Comelec) by Buhay.

The other upper limit set by the framers of the 1986 Constitution relates to the allowable number of party-list seats in Congress. The limit is 20 percent of the total number of Lower House members. The present member of that Chamber is 268. On this issue a judicial controversy is raging because, whereas the Constitution sets the number of members of the House of Representatives at 250, the high court in a more recent decision brought the membership of the Lower House up to the aforementioned figure of 268.

From the start, the party-list concept has been a highly controversial and widely opposed constitutional innovation. Regular members of the House of Representatives have always shown disdain and resentment, albeit unexpressed toward party-list congressmen, whom they consider to have entered the legislature through the back door and without expending as much treasure an effort as they did. But if the party-list members of the Lower House are disdained by their colleagues, that is not the case with Malacañang. The famous Rodante Marcoleta and another party-list congressman were part of the phalanx of legislators that Gloria Arroyo took with her on her most recent foreign trip.

The introduction of the party-list concept was without a doubt one of the most far-sighted and equitable innovations introduced into this country’s Basic Law by the members of the 1986 constitutional commission. But the dramatic rise in the number of party-list men and women admitted to the House of Representatives strongly suggests something having gone amiss in the implementation of the constitutional provision on the party-list concept. A revisit of the idea is in order. Mere mention of the words balloon blowers, balut vendors (now represented by Gloria Arroyo’s sister-in-law) and security guards (now represented by the much-reviled ret. Gen. Jovito Palparan) provides strong support for the revisit.

One of the handful of party-list parties represented in western Europe’s parliament is the Green Party. Considering the international threat posed by climate change, I cannot imagine anyone seriously questioning the legitimacy of Green Party representation in a western European — nay, any — legislature.

But the plethora of mini-sectors of Philippine society represented in Congress by party-list representatives suggests anti-marginalization having run amuck. Every minor profession and every mini-activity in this country now wants its “cause” to be represented in Congress. The 257 total of applications for party-list inclusion received before last week’s Comelec deadline suggests a gross misconception and misapplication of the party-list concept.

An elected representative of the people — call him a congressman or a Deputy or a member of Parliament — is expected to do his best to minister to the needs of each and every member of his constituency. He is expected to manage his time, energy and PDAF (the euphemistic name for pork barrel) so efficiently that he can address the concerns of the balloon blowers, the balut vendors, the barbers, the caregivers, the disabled, the youth, and so forth, as equitably and concernedly as possible. The world is a diver’s place, and so are congressional districts and barangays. One does not improve the operation of kitchen by placing 50 more cooks in it.

What should a revisit of the party-list concept seek to achieve? Three things. First, it should put an immediate stop to the proliferation of party-list groups applying to the Comelec for accreditation. Second, a revisit should bring about general acceptance of the object for which the party-list concept was borrowed and incorporated into the Constitution. That object is the according of special treatment to only the truly special fields of human endeavor and third, general acceptance — especially by the Comelec and the courts — of the real meaning of marginalization. State action is required, and should be taken, only when marginalization threatens the continued existence of some elemental part of Philippine society. Balloon blowers and balut vendors don’t fall within that definition. –Rudy Romero, Daily Tribune

(My e-mail address is rudy_v_romero@yahoo.com).