SC upholds Estrada’s eligibility to run for mayor

MANILA, Philippines–The Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld the eligibility of deposed President and convicted plunderer Joseph Estrada to run for mayor of Manila in the 2013 elections as it denied the motion for reconsideration filed by the former mayor of Manila, Alfredo Lim.

Spokesman Theodore Te said the high tribunal, in Tuesday’s en banc session, ruled that “no substantial argument was raised [by Lim] to merit a reconsideration.”

Last January, the high court dismissed the consolidated petitions filed by Lim, the runner-up in the 2013 polls, and his lawyer Alicia Risos-Vidal. The two had argued that Estrada’s conviction and life imprisonment sentence in 2007 had rendered unqualified to run for public office.

The court, voting 11 to 3, backed the position of the Commission on Elections that the pardon granted to Estrada in 2008 by then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo was absolute, and thus restored his eligibility to stand as a candidate for mayor.

Vidal did not file a motion for reconsideration.–Jerome Aning