By YVONNE T. CHUA
PRESIDENT Benigno Aquino III has further strengthened his lock on the House of Representatives with 108 members of the Liberal Party likely to make it to the 16th Congress, official and unofficial counts of Monday’s midterm elections show.
The figure is a big leap from the 92 Liberals who make up two-fifths of the district representatives in the present chamber. Aquino is chair of the Liberal Party.
The LP’s dominance in the House is in sharp contrast to its small force in the current Senate, which will practically remain the same when Congress opens in July.
Although Aquino’s Team PNoy coalition is assured of nine of its 12 senatorial candidates winning, in reality only one candidate, his namesake and nephew Bengino “Bam” Aquino IV, is a member of the LP.
The Aquino administration instead has had to bank on the “winnability” of members of other parties to ensure it would have a firm footing in the Senate that is led by Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile of the opposition United Nationalist Alliance.
The other eight leading Team PNoy candidates are from the Nacionalista Party (Alan Peter Cayetano, Antonio Trillanes IV and Cynthia Villar), PDP-Laban (Aquilino Pimentel III), Nationalist People’s Coalition (Loren Legarda), Laban ng Demokratikong Pilipino (Juan Edgardo “Sonny” Angara) and independent (Grace Poe-Llamanzares and Francis Escudero).
Bam Aquino’s impending entry to Congress will bring to only four the number of LP members in the Senate— unless Ramon “Jun” Magsaysay Jr., another LP senatorial bet, would somehow land the hotly contested 12th place currently held by UNA’s Gregorio Honasan. Incumbent LP senators are Franklin Drilon, Teofisto Guingona III and Ralph Recto.[hr]
Based on results tallied in both unofficial and official counts as of early Wednesday afternoon, the 16th Congress Senate is shaping up to be a chamber with at least four LP members; at least four members from the opposition United Nationalist Alliance (including incumbents Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile and Jinggoy Estrada and incoming Nancy Binay and JV Ejercito); five NP members (including incumbents Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and Pia Cayetano); two members from Lakas (Lito Lapid and Bong Revilla); two from NPC (including incumbent Tito Sotto); one PDP-Laban; People’s Reforms Party’s Miriam Defensor Santiago; and three independents (including incumbent Sergio Osmena III).
Philippine politics has been characterized by a weak party system that has been debilitated by factionalism within political parties that eventually splinter and lead to establishment of new parties. The Liberal Party was a breakaway of the Nacionalista Party; Lakas, of the LDP; and, more recently, the National Unity Party (NUP), of the Lakas Kampi CMD that decided to align itself with the administration Liberal Party, especially in the House of Representatives. Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr., a member of the Liberal Party, is NUP honorary chairman.
Political “turncoatism” or party switching is rampant, especially to the ruling party after elections.
The LP itself benefited from massive defections from other parties following Aquino’s election to the presidency. It started out with only 45 seats in the House of Representatives after the 2010 elections. Eventual defections from other parties boosted its membership in the House to 92.
Political parties in the Philippines are also known to form coalitions during and after elections. But the alliances are at best tenuous, with members of respective parties refusing to abide by agreements made by the coalition, or parties eventually abandoning the group over disagreements.
President Aquino, however, remains assured of solid support from the House of Representatives: 108 Liberals are leading or have won the races nationwide, tallies show.
NPC and NUP, both allies of the Liberal Party, will have fewer representatives in the House but remain blocs to reckon with. Forty-two NPC bets are leading in their districts and NUP, 24. Another ally, Nacionalista, has 19.
LP allies had helped the President and his party get the impeachment complaint against then Chief Justice Renato Corona past the House of Representatives in December 2011. Corona was tried and convicted by the Senate the following year.
Pangasinan remains a stronghold of the NPC, where Mark Cojuangco, the son of party patriarch Eduardo Cojuangco Jr., lives. NPC fielded Gina de Venecia, wife of former Speaker and Lakas stalwart Jose de Venecia, in one of the province’s districts. Isabela, where the Dy dynasty thrives, and Negros Oriental remain NPC countries, as well as portions of Tarlac, Rizal, Negros Occidental, South Cotabato and Lanao del Norte.
Tallies as of May 15 show the composition of opposition UNA in the House likely dwindling to eight and Lakas to 13.
Detained former President Gloria Arroyo is the lone Lakas candidate who made it in Pampanga’s four-district congressional race. The party’s showing in Camarines Sur is better, where Arroyo’s son Dato is leading in the second district and Rolando Anadaya in the first.
Not surprisingly, Makati, home to the Binays, is solid UNA. Boxing champ Manny Pacquiao also won in Sarangani’s lone district as UNA candidate.
The emerging House will see 144 reelectionist, 71 of them from the Liberal Party. Fifty-five of them will be on their third term and 87 on their second. Sixty-four women are also poised to assume seats in the chamber.
Founded in 1946, the Liberal Party is the country’s second oldest party after the Nacionalista Party. It has produced four vice presidents and four presidents, including Manuel Roxas, Elpidio Quirino, Diosdado Macapagal and Benigno Aquino III.
Ferdinand Marcos, who was elected president as a Nacionalista candidate, was once LP president who quit when the party chose to field Macapagal for reelection. Macapagal lost. Macapagal’s daughter, Gloria Arroyo, was also an LP member but left for Lakas under whose banner she ran for vice president and later for president in 2004. The LP supported Arroyo in 2004.
Aquino, a Liberal Party stalwart like his late father, was a member of the House (2004-2007) and of the Senate (2007-2010).