As the 20th Congress is set to resume this month, rumblings of elected party lists replacing their representative nominees have been echoing in the House of Representatives. Such a process is called substitution.

But while this process remains legal and allowed under the law and the Rules of the House, civil society organizations, pro-democracy groups, and even lawmakers themselves have been calling for changes to the process. Substitutions have been seen to circumvent elections, promote traditional politics, and contribute to an elite capture of the party-list system.

Under RA 7941 or the Partylist System Act, substitution is allowed in the event of a vacancy in the position, where the next qualified nominee in the list automatically assumes the seat, subject to Commission on Elections (Comelec) verification. The legality of this process has been consistently upheld by the Supreme Court in its decisions. Essentially, since the electorate voted for the partylists and not necessarily the nominee, substitution does not violate the electorate’s will. Rather, the partylist has the prerogative to replace its members if it finds justifiable grounds.

Some grounds for substitution, however, seem to be more justifiable than others. In instances of death or incapacity of a nominee, disqualification, or their appointment to another public office, the need to replace the nominee is obvious and urgent. On the other hand, there have been instances where a nominee or nominees of the party suddenly resign or are surreptitiously removed immediately upon proclamation. This raises the question of whether the rule on substitution is being abused to provide some politicians a “backdoor entry” to Congress.

Bait-and-switch?

Civil society groups have repeatedly raised the criticism that substitution enables individuals never presented to voters during the campaign to enter the House of Representatives, particularly when initial nominees resign or nominee reshuffling occurs almost immediately after proclamation.

Most notably, substitution enabled Representative Yedda Romualdez to return to the House in the 20th Congress, taking the third seat won by Tingog Partylist after the simultaneous resignation of its third, fourth, and fifth nominees. However, Comelec chairperson George Erwin Garcia stressed that this was allowed under the Partylist System Act since Representative Romualdez was included in the list of nominees submitted by the party upon its proclamation.

This is distinct from the case of then-nominee of the P3PWD partylist and former Comelec commissioner Rowena Guanzon, whose nomination was voided by the Supreme Court. After obtaining a seat in the 2022 elections, the proclaimed representative and the other four nominees of the partylist all resigned, to be replaced supposedly by Guanzon and four other nominees. In this case, the Court emphasized that such a substitution directly affects “the voters’ right to know the identities of the nominees from partylists.” Such knowledge, according to the Court, allows voters to make informed and intelligent choices on election day.

But whether substitutions happen after election, after proclamation, or years into the organization’s election into office, abrupt and drastic changes to the list and order of nominees would always raise questions about the sincerity of partylists in actually presenting qualified and well-intentioned representatives.

For sectoral partylists, it is a common consideration among voters if a presented nominee actually belongs to the sector he or she wishes to represent. If abused, substitution can be used to install nominees with weak links to the sector, without being properly vetted by the voting public or the sector claimed to be represented. This is also true for cause-oriented partylists, where politicians who have weak credentials in their claimed advocacy could easily skip over nominees who have stronger track records.

For partylist representation as a whole, manipulative substitution threatens to worsen the perceived “elite-capture” of the system, as political clans continue to dominate even this particular area of representation, supposedly reserved for the economically and ideologically marginalized and underrepresented.

This is especially true for the 20th Congress, where according to the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ), over 80% of the 254 district representatives belong to political families. Meanwhile, according to the Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS), at least 78 out of the 156 partylists certified by Comelec to run in the elections last year came from political families. 

Proposed reforms

While there continues to be valid grounds for replacing nominees, and while partylists retain their right to self-organization and discipline, reforms are necessary to safeguard the partylist system from opportunistic politics, deceptive campaigning, and the domination of political dynasties.

Several interventions have been proposed in the previous Congress to reform the substitution process, limiting replacement of nominees even after proclamation. One of which is the public disclosure and review of all potential substitute nominees, to ensure that all potential nominee replacements possess sufficient qualifications to represent the sector one claims to advocate. Meanwhile, for advocacy-oriented partylists, a record of continuous engagement in the advocacy must be established in order to prevent pretenders from posing as advocates of a particular cause just to secure power.

Another proposal is to allow Representatives to contest substitutions through public hearings. This would supposedly avoid arbitrary and capricious power-grabs within their parties, and ensure that replacements possess equal if not superior qualifications to the Representative being replaced.

Electoral reform advocates like Kontra Daya have also repeatedly recommended the restriction of substitutions to death or permanent incapacity. This would avoid “voluntary resignation substitutions” from mere “dummies” or “placeholders” who were only selected for subsequent replacement. 

At a time where corruption scandals remain unresolved, “voluntary resignations” and substitutions in elected partylists without good reason should justifiably raise suspicion. Many involved in corruption issues remain at-large, unknown, yet armed with wealth and influence. All the more, it is more important that we guard against those with much to hide a secret entry to power.

No more backdoors. No more lies. If they want a seat in our House, they must earn it like everybody else: through earning our votes. – Rappler.com

Vin Buenaagua is a graduate of BA Political Science from the University of the Philippines and the Juris Doctor program of the San Beda College of Alabang-School of Law.