Fight for last 3 Senate spots cliffhanger

As the Inquirer predicted on Thursday, the results of the race for the last three spots in the senatorial election would be a cliffhanger.

Commission on Elections (Comelec) Chairman Sixto Brillantes Jr. On Monday said the fight for the last three of the 12 Senate seats at stake in the elections would be close, especially for the 11th and the 12th seats.

The 12th spot, held by reelectionist Sen. Gregorio “Gringo” Honasan II in the preelection polls, would be a shaky place, with Brillantes talking about a “13th candidate” likely pushing up to break into the ranks of winners.

In the final preelection poll taken by the Social Weather Stations on May 2 and 3, the 13th placer was Juan “Jack” Ponce Enrile Jr. of the opposition United Nationalist Alliance (UNA), but in the early, unofficial count by the Comelec’s citizen arm Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting (PPCRV) on Monday night he was way down in the 16th spot.

But former Sen. Richard Gordon, another UNA candidate, who placed 17th in the final SWS poll, was in 13th place, threatening to dislodge Honasan from the 12th spot.

Asked when the final results of the senatorial race would be known, Brillantes said, “We hope we will be able to proclaim all 12 by Wednesday.”

But because he expected a close fight for the last three places, Brillantes hedged and said, “We will try to proclaim as many as we can from Wednesday night.”

Counting the votes

Brillantes said voter turnout was likely to hit 70 percent, lower than 76 percent in 2010.

But then the presidency was at stake in the 2010 vote, while Monday’s balloting, for which there were 52 million registered voters, was for congressional and local offices only.

The full complement of the Comelec sat as the National Board of Canvassers at 6 Monday night, with the election commissioners wearing their black and red robes, to initiate the Consolidation and Canvassing System that would allow the transmission of votes for counting on the national level.

The canvassing board is made up of Brillantes and Election Commissioners Lucenito Tagle, Elias Yusoph, Grace Padaca, Christian Robert Lim, Al Parreno and Luie Tito Guia.

The lawyers of the senatorial candidates were present, inspecting each piece of material needed for the process, including a laptop and a printer.

Election lawyer George Garcia and former Comelec commisioner Gregorio Larrazabal told the Inquirer in separate interviews that the canvassing of national votes would likely start Tuesday.

Team PNoy dominance

Garcia explained that the votes would first be canvassed at the municipal level, city and provincial levels before being transmitted to the national canvassing board in Manila for the official count.

But like Brillantes, he expected the winners to be proclaimed Wednesday.

President Aquino expects his Team PNoy to dominate the senatorial election and deliver his legislative priorities for his last three years in Malacañang.

Excellent delivery would give whoever he endorses to succeed him an edge in the race for Malacañang in 2016, which his Vice President, Jejomar Binay, has been preparing for since setting up office in the Coconut Palace three years ago.

Binay’s United Nationalist Alliance (UNA) senatorial team ate the dust of Aquino’s candidates in the preelection polls.

Only three of UNA’s nine candidates were in the Top 12 in the early, unofficial results—Binay’s daughter Nancy, former President Joseph Estrada’s son JV Ejercito and Honasan.

To boost the chances of his weakest candidates, the Vice President, in voting on Monday, left three senatorial slots unshaded after voting for all nine UNA candidates.

That means he did not vote for Sen. Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III, president of his own party, the PDP-Laban, who ran for reelection on President Aquino’s Team PNoy.

“If I vote for another candidate, that will increase his votes. I know we have only nine candidates,” Binay told reporters after voting in Makati City.

Who will survive?

Pimentel quit UNA when the alliance insisted on taking in former Bukidnon Rep. Juan Miguel Zubiri, whom he had accused of cheating him in the 2007 senatorial election. He joined the administration’s Team PNoy.

His civic duty done, Binay began to wait to see who among the UNA candidates would make it to the Senate.

Estrada, also a leader of UNA, said the alliance’s objective was 6-6, meaning the team’s best hope was to get six of the Senate seats at stake, leaving the other six to the administration candidates.

Binay said he was confident his daughter Nancy, a newcomer in politics, would win despite biting criticisms of her during the campaign, especially her lack of experience in public service.

Asked if he was nervous about Nancy’s chances, Binay replied, “Not anymore. At this point, I know she’s going to win.”

Almost certainly, Binay will use UNA for his Malacañang run in 2016.

Honasan said the alliance would stay together no matter how it fared in the elections.

Shared experience

He said UNA was a strong team, but disagreed with the view of some analysts that the group’s strength stemmed from the belief that Binay would be the presidential front-runner in 2016.

For him, he said, shared advocacies hold the members of the alliance together.

For Ejercito, the shared experience of the campaign strengthened the relationship among the UNA candidates who came from different groups.

“The campaign we went through was a difficult experience. Of course, if you go through a hard time together, you will form some sort of a bond. That’s a big factor,” he said.

He noted that UNA had a hard time going up against Team PNoy, which had the President as main endorser.

Citing an example, Ejercito said UNA was hard pressed to match the sheer number of expensive television ads that the administration team put out during the campaign.

Honasan said that if it were up to him, party switching would not be such an easy thing to do in the Philippines.

He said he planned to push for a two-party system so that there would be more focus on platforms and programs.

He said he hoped that this would bring maturity to Philippine politics and the way the people elect their leaders.

But he has to survive this election first.

They also ran

Independent senatorial candidate Ricardo Penson and Samson Alcantara of the Social Justice Society, who also contested the race for the Senate, went home after voting on Monday to wait for the results.

Alcantara said he spent the day reading text messages from supporters from around the country who told him they campaigned and voted for him.

“It feels good [receiving the text messages]. I thank them all for their support,” he said.

“I had a haircut and a massage,” Penson said, adding that he would stay at home, but his staff would man his campaign headquarters.—With reports from Christian V. Esguerra and Jerome C. Aning