Finally, the Magsasaka sa Sakahan, Kaunlaran Party-list has a representative in the 19th Congress after agricultural entrepreneur Robert Gerard Nazal Jr., the party’s nominee, took his oath of office as a member of the lower chamber.

It took four months for Nazal to take his oath because of an internal dispute within the party that was later on resolved by the Commission on Elections (Comelec).

The newly-minted lawmaker took his oath of office before Judge Jose Paneda of the Quezon City Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 220 on Monday, Oct. 10, the same day the poll body issued a Certificate of Proclamation in his favor for being the qualified nominee of the party-list group.

Right after taking his oath of office, Nazal paid a courtesy call on Speaker Ferdinand Martin Romualdez at the Batasang Pambansa. He also met with House Majority Leader Manuel Jose “Mannix” Dalipe and Senior Deputy Majority Leader Ferdinand Alexander “Sandro” Marcos.

A statement from Magsasaka denounced the statements made by former Magsasaka Party-list Rep. Argel Joseph Cabatbat, who leads another faction within the group, against Nazal’s eligibility to represent the party in the 19th Congress. The other faction was led by the group’s national chair, Soliman Villamin Jr.

The group said Cabatbat “has no authority to determine who the official members of the party-list are, given that he and his splinter group have been disavowed by the Comelec", referring to the poll body’s resolution awarding Magsasaka to Villamin.

“For the record, Mr. Nazal has been an esteemed member of the rightful, Comelec-approved Magsasaka Party-list for quite some time,” the group said in the statement.

“This makes Cabatbat’s other claim – that the highly respected agricultural entrepreneur Robert Nazal was a previous nominee of another party-List (Pasahero) – pitifully inaccurate and easy to debunk. A quick back-check of official Comelec records will show that Mr. Nazal was never a nominee of any other party-List,” it added.

Nazal was the group’s third nominee but became its representative after the withdrawal of the first and second nominees—King Cortez and Villamin Jr.

The infighting within the party-list organization started in June 2019 when Villamin Jr. was “unceremoniously and illegally voted out” of Magsasaka’s Council of Leaders and ultimately expelled from the party in November that year.

Villamin Jr. heads the DV Boer Farm International Corp., where Cabatbat served as legal counsel until a falling out.

In his filing with the Comelec, Villamin Jr. argued that his removal from office and expulsion from the party were illegal.

The Comelec sided with Villamin Jr. and held that his removal as national chair and the subsequent conduct of special elections held on Dec. 21, 2019 was “null and void".

It ruled that Villamin Jr. was not accorded the basic requisite of notice and opportunity to be heard.

The group said that the poll body’s resolution “rendered the entity of Cabatbat and his splinter group as officially-recognized Magsasaka Party-List members null and void".