MANILA, Philippines—A day after Senator Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino declared his presidential bid, political personalities and candidates and even former foes are now scrambling to join his group, the Liberal Party (LP), party officials said on Thursday.

And to accommodate these applicants, LP chairman and former Senator Franklin Drilon said the party would now form an “arbitration” committee to screen them.

“I have asked personally the campaign manager, Congressman (Florencio) “Butch” Abad to come up with a special committee in the party, which will now screen all of these applicants,” he said at a regular forum in the Senate.

“We are not exaggerating. Many have returned to join the campaign, seeking to become official candidate at the local level, to become official candidate of the party,” he said.

But he added: “We have to be very careful because this is a very sensitive issue in the local politics . We might lose votes because of our choices in the local level.”

“So now the party is putting up a screening committee, which would ultimately be an arbitration committee now to arbitrate on these different political personalities and candidates, who would want n to join the party,” he said.

Drilon expressed confidence that that the groundswell of support for Aquino’s candidacy “is very deep and very well and is not only a surface kind of thing.”

“It’s deep. The support for Noynoy is deep and we could feel it even though we don’t have money. They can see the support of the public,” Drilon said.

Aside from lack of funds to bankroll the campaign, Drilon said LP does not have enough time to mount a national campaign.

But Senator Francis Pangilinan was confident funds would go to “where the groundswell is.”

For the meantime, Pangilinan called on those planning to join the LP to support Aquino’s candidacy without any conditions.

The senator said the party is open to unity talk with any groups or personalities but there should be no strings attached.

Pangilinan particularly directed the statement to the group of Environment Secretary Lito Atienza, who allied with the administration and formed a breakaway party in 2005 instead of joining LP’s quit call on President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.