Makabayan solons in the 20th Congress have filed a bill seeking a prohibition on political dynasties, saying it is high time to pass such a measure.

ACT Teachers Party-list Rep. Antonio Tinio and Kabataan Party-list Rep. Renee Louise Co filed House Bill (HB) No.209—one of its priority measures—as they cited a Constitutional provision that guarantees equal access to public service that prohibits political dynasties.

''Social reform is the evident agenda behind this provision and the objective is clear,'' they said in their explanatory note.

''The extended family system...has found its pernicious effects in the political arena where public office has become the exclusive domain of influential families and clans. Such families have become so well-entrenched in Philippine politics that they have monopolized political power and public resources at all levels of government,'' they added.

Under the bill, a political dynasty is defined as a family or clan that concentrates, consolidates, or perpetuates their political power by holding public office simultaneously or successively.

The bill prohibits any person to hold or run for any elective national or local officesimultaneously with another within the fourth degree of consanguinity or affinity, whether legitimate or illegitimate, full or half blood.

It also prohibits any person within the prohibited civil degree of relationship to an incumbent elected official to succeed to the position of the latter.

Tinio and Co argued that a politician, once elected to public office, immediately builds a strong political base to ensure not only his or her re-election but also for such electoral support to extend to his or her spouse or descendants, or even next of kin.

''This bill is hereby proposed to give real teeth to the Constitutional mandate and strengthen the call for new politics to lay the basis of greater empowerment for the greater number of Filipinos,'' read HB No.209.