LP may be declared dominant minority party, says Melo

The Liberal Party (LP) will most likely be declared the dominant minority party in the May 10 polls, said the Commission on Elections (Comelec) after the Supreme Court (SC) rejected the coalition between the Nacionalista Party (NP) and the Nationalist People’s Coalition (NPC). “Tentatively, the (dominant) majority party will be Lakas-Kampi-CMD (Party) and, probably, the minority will be the LP," Comelec chairman Jose Melo told reporters in an ambush interview. The poll body chief, however, said that his statement was based on his own evaluation of the situation. He likewise said that they were supposed to take up the matter on Thursday but failed to do so. LP, the NP-NPC Coalition, and the Puwersa ng Masang Pilipino are all vying for the poll body’s nod to become the dominant minority party in the May 10 elections, which is entitled to the sixth copy of the election returns (ERs) and to a server connected to the Comelec computer network, which will display the election results as they are transmitted from the precinct clusters. The LP however opposed the NP-NPC application, saying that the coalition was formed only to meet the poll body’s requirement that the dominant minority party field the most number of candidates in the national and local elections. (See: LP opposes NP-NPC application as dominant minority party) Comelec records show that the LP is fielding 5,934 candidates in the polls, while the NP is fielding 5,565, and NPC 2,373. Republic Act 9369 or the amended Poll Automation Law requires each Precinct Count Optical Scan (PCOS) machine to print 30 copies of its ERs, which represent the voting results at the level of precinct clusters. —JV, GMANews.TV