2016 POLL PROTEST | Election tribunal rules Marcos will still lose even when votes in Mindanao are not counted

April 20, 2021 , 09:36 PM

(April 20, 2021) – The Supreme Court (SC), sitting as the Presidential Electoral Tribunal (PET), threw out the appeal of the late dictator’s son to annul the election results in three Muslim provinces in the south, saying the tribunal has no reason to look into his third complaint.

In a 92-page decision, the PET said it found no sufficient basis to annul the results in Lanao del Sur, Basilan, and Maguindanao because the accusations “appeared bare, laden with generic and repetitious allegations and lacked critical information.”

Former senator Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos is contesting the 2016 vice presidential victory of Leonor “Leni” Robredo, accusing the vice president of electoral fraud. Robredo, who was elected separately from the president under the country’s election laws, won by less than 300,000 votes.

In February, the tribunal junked Marcos’ poll protest but the full copy of the decision was only released on Monday.

“What this Tribunal faces today is not an extreme case of fraud that deserves consideration,” the decision, penned by Associate Justice Marvic Leonen, reads.

“Protestant failed to make his case. There is no substantial recovery of votes in the pilot provinces that he himself had designated. To entertain the third cause of action is to risk frustrating the valid exercise of the nation’s democratic will and subject it to the endless whims of a defeated candidate.”

The justices also argued the dictator’s namesake should have made his case through the pilot provinces his camp initially chose, namely Camarines Sur, Iloilo, and Negros Oriental, as stipulated in the PET Rule 65.

Marcos filed his poll protest nearly five years ago questioning Robredo’s slim election victory. After a recount of votes in those three provinces, Robredo’s margin grew by an estimated 15,000 votes.

If Marcos believed there was massive fraud in the three Mindanao provinces, he should have chosen those as his pilot areas, according to the PET.

But even when the total votes in said provinces in the south would be annulled, the PET said Robredo would still have won by a slim margin of 15,130.

Marcos, however, refused to recognize the decision, accusing Leonen for viewing the case “through his yellow lenses” even when Leonen was not the sole justice who decided on the case.

All magistrates unanimously decided to junk Marcos’ poll protest, with seven justices fully concurring to its dismissal. The eight other justices who only affirmed the decision issued a separate concurring opinion.

“The PET should do everything in its power to ascertain who really won as Vice President,” Marcos said in a statement issued by his lawyer and spokesman Vic Rodriguez.

“The truth should not be limited to the existence or non-existence of the Rules on Annulment because at the end of the day, it will be the people themselves who will be deprived of ascertaining who the real victor in the 2016 elections were.”

Robredo’s camp welcomed the decision, which they hope would formally settle the dispute after more than four long years, according to Atty. Barry Gutierrez, her spokesman.

Pinatunayan ng paglalabas ng desisyon ng PET sa electoral protest laban kay Vice Pres. Leni Robredo na “baseless” at “unfounded” ang mga akusasyon ng dayaan sa 2016 elections, ayon kay Atty. Barry Gutierrez.

Posted by News5 on Tuesday, April 20, 2021

“The unequivocal declaration in the decision that the protest ‘failed to substantiate’ its ‘sweeping allegations’ of supposed fraud, validates what has been our long-standing position: that the protest was baseless and unfounded from the beginning,” Gutierrez said.

(Beatrice Puente/MM)

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