Philippine parliamentary election, 1978

April 7 and 27, 1978

165 seats of the Batasang Pambansa 83 seats needed for a majority

	First party	Second party

Leader	Ferdinand Marcos	Hilario Davide, Jr.
Party	KBL	Pusyon Bisaya
Leader since	1978	1978
Leader's seat	President/Prime Minister	Region VII
Last election	new party	new party
Seats won	137	13
Seat change	137	13
Popular vote	147,885,439	9,495,416
Percentage	71.1	4.6

	Third party	Fourth party

Leader	Reuben R. Canoy	Benigno Aquino, Jr.
Party	Mindanao Alliance	LABAN
Leader since	1978	1978
Leader's seat	Region X	Region IV-A (lost seat)
Last election	new party	new party
Seats won	1	0
Seat change	1
Popular vote	6,685,224	21,541,600
Percentage	3.2	10.4

Prime Minister before election

Abolished

Prime Minister-designate

Ferdinand Marcos
KBL

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A general election was held in the Philippines on April 7, 1978 for the election of the 166 (of the 208) regional representatives to the Interim Batasang Pambansa (the nation's first parliament). The elections were participated by the leading opposition party, the Lakas ng Bayan (LABAN) which had twenty-one candidates for the Metro Manila area and the leading candidate was the jailed opposition leader Ninoy Aquino while the regime's party known as the Kilusang Bagong Lipunan (KBL) which was led by the then First Lady Imelda Marcos. Ninoy was allowed to run by the his fellow party mates in the Liberal Party who boycotted the elections but was not allowed to campaign, so his family campaigned for him. The night before the elections on April 6, 1978, a noise barrage was organized by the supporters of (LABAN) which occurred up to dawn.

Background

The Philippines was under martial law since 1972, thereby the incumbent president Ferdinand Marcos ruled by decree. Prior to this, the Constitution of the Philippines was being drafted by the Constitutional Convention whose delegates were elected in 1970. The Constitutional Convention approved the final draft of the Constitution which consisted of the abolition of the Philippine Congress and replaced with an interim National Assembly to consisted of the President, the Vice-President, the President of the Constitutional Convention and Members of the Senate and House of Representatives in November 1972 and later ratified on January 17, 1973 through so-called "citizens' assemblies". The Constitution were amended twice in July 27–28, 1973 and February 27–28, 1975. The Constitution was amended once again in October 16–17, 1976 which contained the "Amendment No. 6" which changed the name of the interim National Assembly from the "National Assembly" to "Batasang Pambansa" more commonly as the "Batasan".

Campaign

Lakas ng Bayan

Main article: Lakas ng Bayan

In 1978, from his prison cell, Aquino was allowed to take part in the elections. Although his friends, former Senators Gerry Roxas and Jovito Salonga, preferred to boycott the elections, Aquino urged his supporters to organize and run 21 candidates in Metro Manila. Thus his political party, dubbed Lakas ng Bayan ("People's Power"), was born. The party's acronym was "LABAN" ("fight" in Tagalog). He was allowed one television interview on Face the Nation (hosted by Ronnie Nathanielsz) and proved to a startled and impressed populace that imprisonment had neither dulled his rapier-like tongue nor dampened his fighting spirit. Foreign correspondents and diplomats asked what would happen to the LABAN ticket. People agreed with him that his party would win overwhelmingly in an honest election. On April 6, 1978, supporters of the Lakas ng Bayan (LABAN), the opposition party headed by former Senator Benigno Aquino, Jr. who was still in jail and twenty other candidates contesting the Region IV-A (Metro Manila) seats, came out in protest by asking bystanders and cars to make noise in support the opposition.

Kilusang Bagong Lipunan

President Marcos created the Kilusang Bagong Lipunan (New Society Movement)

Results

**Summary of the 7 April 1978 Interim Batasang Pambansa election results**
Parties and coalitions		Votes	%	Seats	%
	KBL	147,885,439	71.1	137	83.0
	LABAN	21,541,600	10.4	0	0.0
	Pusyon Bisaya	9,495,416	4.6	13	7.9
	Bagong Lipunan-Kilusan ng Nagkakaisang Nacionalista, Liberal	7,981,060	3.8	14	8.5
	Mindanao Alliance	6,685,224	3.2	1	0.6
	Bicol Saro	2,105,599	1.0	0	0.0
	Young Philippines	1,471,381	0.7	0	0.0
	Concerned Citizens' Aggrupation	1,374,549	0.7	0	0.0
	Nacionalista	688,130	0.3	0	0.0
	Emancipated Scientists	392,819	0.2	0	0.0
	Partido ng Bagong Pilipino	140,365	0.1	0	0.0
	Democratic	112,140	0.1	0	0.0
	Philippine Labor	94,287	0.0	0	0.0
	Confederation of Ilocano Associations	81,594	0.0	0	0.0
	Consumers	69,216	0.0	0	0.0
	Citizens Union Progress	44,893	0.0	0	0.0
	Youth Democratic Movement	40,571	0.0	0	0.0
	Sovereign Citizens	18,814	0.0	0	0.0
	Partido Sambayanang Pilipino	15,050	0.0	0	0.0
	Lapiang Bagong Silang	11,457	0.0	0	0.0
	Banyuhay	11,190	0.0	0	0.0
	Independent	7,633,851	3.7	0	0.0
Partisan seats				141	85.5
Indirectly elected seats				14	8.5
Appointed seats				10	6.1
Valid votes		207,894,708	100.0	189	100.0
Turnout		18,356,849	85.5
Registered voters		21,464,213	100.0
Source: Teehankee, Julio. "Electoral Politics in the Philippines" (PDF). quezon.ph. Retrieved 2010-12-11.

External links

Official website of the Commission on Elections

Elections and referendums in the Philippines

Presidential elections	1935 1941 1946 1949 1953 1957 1961 1965 1969 1981 1986 1992 1998 2004 2010 2016

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Constitutional Conventions	1934 1970

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Referendums	1935 1937 1939 1940 1947 1967 1973 (Jan) 1973 (Jul) 1975 1976 1977 1981 (Apr) 1981 (Jun) 1984 1987

See also: Local elections and referendums in the Philippines

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