The Commission on Elections (Comelec) is set to proclaim at 3 p.m. today at least 53 winning party-list groups, whose top nominees will occupy 63 seats in the House of Representatives.
The poll body, sitting as the National Board of Canvassers (NBOC), will name them at the Tent City, Manila Hotel.
The winning party-list groups will be based on the canvassed results of 175 certificates of canvass nationwide and overseas, according to Comelec Chairman George Garcia.
The Comelec also released the full list of 155 participating party-lists and the number of votes each received. A total of 41,658,790 votes were recorded for party-lists.
The four leading groups — Akbayan, Duterte Youth, Tingog and 4Ps — are expected to win three seats each, with ACT-CIS and Ako Bicol each securing two seats.
Together, these six parties account for 16 House seats.
Nineteen of the groups anticipated to secure a seat comprise either new entrants or returning party-lists, while 28 are established organizations.
Among the newcomers are Mamamayang Liberal (ML) and Kamanggagawa Party-List.
Meanwhile, election lawyer Robert Labe Jr. sought to simplify the computation of seat allocation.
Section 5, Article VI of the 1987 Constitution provides that “the party-list representatives shall constitute twenty per cent of the total number of representatives including those under the party list.”
In an interview with Manila Standard, Labe said the percentage allocation has been settled by the Supreme Court (SC) in the case of Banat vs. Comelec in relation to Republic Act (RA) No. 7941 or the ‘Party-List System Law.’
This was further confirmed by the High Tribunal in the case of Angkla vs. Comelec in 2021.
He explained that the number of district representatives shall be divided by 80% and will be multiplied by 20% to get the total number of party-list seats.
The election returns are received by the Comelec, tallies all votes casted for partylist groups nationwide and ranks them according to the number of votes received, he added.
Labe noted that the partylist group that gets at least 2% of the total votes is automatically guaranteed one seat, which shall be the first round of distribution.
“After the guaranteed seats are assigned, the remaining seats will be distributed among all parties, including those with less than 2% of the votes, based on their share of the total votes until all remaining numbers of seats allocated for partylist will be filled. The party-lists that received at least 2% votes shall also be the priority to be given additional seats,” he said.
It must also be noted that only the whole numbers are counted; fractions are disregarded.
Earlier, the Comelec announced there are 63 seats designated for party-list representatives representing 20 percent of the total membership of the House of Representatives.
This explains why the Gabriela Women’s Party has submitted a letter requesting the poll body for an investigation for alleged discrepancy in vote after securing only 0.61% of the total party-list votes, according to Labe.
He emphasized that there are only 57 remaining seats available for the second round of allocation while noting that the three-seat limit prescribed by law also applies.
