Thursday, February 15, 2007 'Returnees' among senatorial bets face disqualification
* Poll body accredits 44 groups as party-list organizations
THE Commission on Elections (Comelec) will disqualify senatorial candidates who perennially run in the elections and have lost.
Attorney Josslyn De Mesa of the Comelec's law department identified Manuel Azcuna Po - who now wants to be known as Lapola Po and has filed his certificate of candidacy under the name Fernando Po - as among those who will barred from running for senator.
De Mesa also said candidates of the political party Kilusang Bagong Lipunan (KBL) would not be spared. "I want to study the history of the KBL during the past two elections (to see) if some of their candidates have won in elections. Our records showed that Attorney (Oliver) Lozano had been a perennial candidate in the past," de Mesa told reporters.
Other candidates who had been declared as nuisance bets numerous times are Daniel Ronquillo, Gherry Guillergan, Orlando Abitona, Merlito Lagata, Francisco Tahanan, and Agapito Mendez Jr. and will be disqualified again.
Section 69 of the Omnibus Election Code states that a candidate can be declared s nuisance if he or she fails to prove that he or she can wage a national campaign, has a similar name with a candidate and wants to cause confusion, and has no real intention to run for public office.
De Mesa said the Comelec will look into the cases of Lozano and Melchor Chavez, two senatorial bets of the KBL and who ran but lost in past elections.
Moreover, she explained that while candidates running under a political party mean that he or she can wage a nationwide campaign, having run and lost in a number of elections may also be considered as mocking the election process.
Meanwhile, the Comelec has accredited 44 or 153 organizations as party-list groups for the May elections
Comelec Chairman Benjamin Abalos Sr. said the 44 party-list groups have proven that they represent a marginalized sector of the society and were thus accredited by the commission en banc.
Among those that made were accredited were Bayan Muna, Association of Philippine Electric Cooperative (Apec), Akbayan Citizen's Action Party (Akbayan), Citizen's
Battle Against Corruption (Cibac), Buhay Hayaan Yumabong (Buhay), Partido ng Manggagawa, Gabriela Women's Party (Gabriela), and Migrante Sectoral Party of Overseas Filipinos and Their Families.
"Issuance of the certificate of accreditation is still pending but they could still file their nominations until the 29th of March," Abalos added. (MSN/Sunnex)
