Bayan Muna party-list claims that it was targeted by “electronic vote-shaving” during the May 9, 2022 elections, leading to their loss of a seat in the House of Representatives in the upcoming 19th Congress.

Bayan Muna has consecutively held seats in the House since the 12th Congress; but now, for the first time since the 2001 elections, Bayan Muna will not have a representative in the Lower Chamber.

Despite them earning three House seats in the 2019 elections after earning around 1.1 million votes, they garnered only 217,745 votes or 0.6005 percent of the total in 2022. This wasn't enough to grant the party-list a seat.

“After assessing the conduct and outcome of the May 9, 2022 elections, we have come to believe that Bayan Muna's loss in the party-list elections might have been caused by massive vote-shaving via electronic cheating in the 2022 flawed automated elections,” Bayan Muna said in a statement.

“That Bayan Muna's votes were drastically cut by 80 percent, from 1.117 to around 219,000, is simply unbelievable and unacceptable...The last time Bayan Muna votes registered such a significant decrease was in 2016 elections. From 946,000 plus in 2013, its counted votes was 606,000 in 2016, but, still far more than enough to get a seat in Congress,” the party-list continued.

“Even at the height of red-tagging, black propaganda, harassment and dirty operation against the progressive party-lists by the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) and the Duterte regime in 2019, Bayan Muna still managed to double its votes from 606,000 to 1.117 ,” they said.

Meanwhile, on Tuesday, June 7, Manila Bulletin reported on the NTF-ELCAC’s tactics in campaigning against the progressive party-list.

Read more here: https://mb.com.ph/2022/06/07/how-ntf-elcac-proved-to-be-a-thorn-in-makabayan-blocs-election-bid/

The NTF-ELCAC, notorious for its red-tagging of progressives and activists, claimed that Bayan Muna’s loss in the 2022 elections stemmed from the NTF-ELCAC’s unmasking–primarily through social media–of Bayan Muna’s alleged status as a legal front to the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army-National Democratic Front (CPP-NPA-NDF).

Red-tagging is an act in which individuals or groups are accused of involvement with communist or terrorist groups, oftentimes the CPP-NPA-NDF.

Bayan Muna–which is a part of the progressive Makabayan bloc in Congress –has vehemently denied any claims or allegations linking them to any terrorist or communist groups.

However, despite the NTF-ELCAC’s attempts at red-tagging Bayan Muna and fellow party-lists of the progressive bloc, Makabayan’s Gabriela Women’s Party and the ACT Teachers Party-list were both successful in getting seats in the 19th Congress.

“As it is, red-tagging and harassment by the state, massive media ads and vote-buying by dynastic and rich party-list candidates are forms of cheating but they cannot cause such a massive and incredible cut in Bayan Muna's votes. Proof of this is that Kabataan Party-list (KPL), Gabriela Women's Party (GWP) and ACT Teachers Party-list were at most able to increase their votes or at least maintain their votes to win a seat in Congress,” Bayan Muna said.

While they won’t be able to push for Congressional seats until 2025, Bayan Muna has said that they would continue to protest against voter fraud, electronic cheating, as well as push for electoral reforms.