REPUBLIC Act (RA) 7941, or the Party-list System Act, is one of the most ingenious pieces of legislation that envisions inclusivity in the representation in Congress for all sectors of Philippine society. The law gives flesh to Section 5, Article 6 of the 1987 Constitution, which provides for the allocation of seats in the House of Representatives for members elected by legislative districts and those voted through the party-list (PL) system. The fundamental law envisions that one-fifth, or 20 percent, of the total number of House legislators will come from the party-lists. By the express intent of RA 7941, party-list representatives will advance the interest of "marginalized and underrepresented sectors, organizations and parties" because, while they lack well-defined political constituencies, they are capable of contributing to the "formulation and enactment of appropriate legislation" that will benefit the nation as a whole.
But there are at least two provisions in RA 7941 that its authors wrote in a manner that shrewd politicians took advantage of to advance their personal interests and political gains. The first deals with the qualifications of a would-be nominee to the party-list elections, as found in Article 9, and the second deals with the allocation of seats to party-lists that surpassed the 2-percent threshold, as found in Article 11.
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