Marcos camp: Robredo should stop tainting PET's integrity

MANILA, Philippines — The camp of former Sen. Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. on Thursday insisted that Vice President Leni Robredo’s assertion on a vote threshold based on a Commission on Elections resolution is erroneous.

Lawyer Vic Rodriguez, spokesperson of Marcos, in a statement, said that the vice president should stop “casting aspersions meant to debase [the Presidential Electoral Tribunal’s] integrity.”

“Robredo cheated her way to the vice presidency and in this [ongoing] manual recount and judicial revision, she is attempting to cheat the Filipino people again by trying to change the rules in the middle of the game,” the lawyer added.

Robredo earlier on Thursday filed a motion for reconsideration at the Supreme Court, which sits as the PET. The vice president asked the tribunal to reverse its ruling that junked her plea, seeking the application of a 25 percent threshold for vote validity.

In her motion, Robredo raised that the tribunal’s decision to apply a 50 percent threshold on validity of votes “has resulted to a systematic decrease in her votes.”

The squabble over threshold pertains to what percentage of the votes should be shaded to be counted.

Cited in the plea are vote counting on Barangay Laganac, Municipality of Balatan, Camarines Sur where Robredo received 358 votes.

Upon the application of the 50 percent threshold, physical recount on the ballot yielded 346 votes for the vice president. Votes for Marcos did not change in tally.

“[I]n simple terms, the votes for protestee Robredo was decreased by 12 votes while the votes for protestant Marcos was maintained,” the motion reads.

READ: Leni Robredo may lose votes due to shading limit

‘Resolution was issued after elections’

Rodriguez also raised that the Comelec resolution cited by Robredo in her motion was issued four months after the elections were held.

The lawyer added that during the protest, the jurisdiction is now with the tribunal. “The election case was filed by [Marcos] June of 2016 and since then jurisdiction of the case is with the PET and no other as provided by Article 8 of the Constitution.”

The power of the PET to try, hear and decide on protests involving the president and vice president was embodied in Republic Act 1793. It states that the PET will be composed of eleven members from the SC: the chief justice and ten associate justices.

Article 8, meanwhile, refers to the judicial department where the SC belongs.

“Since it is the Rules of the Tribunal that shall apply, her invocation of the 25% threshold rule is erroneous as it was made by the Comelec only Sept. 6, 2016, four months after the elections,” Rodriguez said.

He raised: “It is an obvious ploy on the part of the Comelec, then led by the impeached chairman Andres Bautista, to favour Robredo once the revision process starts.”

Marcos, in his protest, contested the results in a total of 132,446 precincts in 39,221 clustered precincts covering 27 provinces and cities. He sought for a recount in Camarines Sur, Iloilo and Negros Oriental covering a total of 5,418 clustered precincts. The recount started on April 2.