Senator Grace Poe. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
CEBU CITY, Philippines — Former Justice Secretary Leila de Lima has expressed hopes that the disqualification cases filed against Senator Grace Poe will be resolved with finality before the printing of ballots for next year’s elections.
“Ultimately, the disqualification cases against Senator Poe will be elevated to the Supreme Court (SC). It would not be good that the ballots will be printed with her name on it and later on she will be eventually disqualified by the Supreme Court,” said De Lima, who was here to speak in the 3rd Liga ng Mga Barangay Convention of Southern Leyte at the Cebu Parklane International Hotel in Cebu City.
De Lima told reporters that she was anxious about what might happen in case Poe would get the most number of votes in the elections but end up disqualified with finality.
Sample ballots being printed out at the National Printing Office in Quezon City. FILE PHOTO
“If the issues won’t be resolved and Grace Poe wins, it would create some instability. If she wins but gets disqualified, will the second placer take her place or will there be a special elections?,” she said.
An old high court ruling, De Lima said, stated that the person who got the second highest number of votes could never take the place of the proclaimed winner.
“But that jurisprudence has been changed with another one, that is the second placer can take the place of the winner who gets disqualified,” she said.
Poe, survey frontrunner among presidential candidates, was disqualified from seeking the highest position in the country by the Commission on Elections last Tuesday.
The Commission on Elections, which acted upon the complaint filed by lawyer Estrella Elamparo, said Poe failed to meet the required 10-year residency requirement provided in the constitution.
De Lima said anyone running to be the next president should meet all the qualifications.
Leila de Lima. RYAN LEAGOGO/INQUIRER.net FILE PHOTO
“The qualification of someone who is vying for the highest post in the land is a fundamental constitutional issue,” she said.
The Senate Electoral Tribunal (SET) earlier dismissed another disqualification case filed against Grace Poe over her status as natural-born citizen.
In a vote of 5-4, the SET junked the petition filed by Rizalito David.
“The SET 5-4 decision was not a unanimous but a majority vote. The Comelec ruling, on the other hand, was a unanimous vote,” De Lima said.
In Negros Occidental, Msgr. Victorino Rivas, rector of the Shrine of Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Bacolod City, said that while lawyers should look into the number of years Poe had resided in the country before running for President, her being a foundling should not be taken against her.
He said many babies have been left at the Church’s doorstep and have been automatically assumed to be Filipinos.
“It is unlikely for such babies to be born in foreign countries and brought to the Philippines to be left at a church,” he said.
“When a foundling is found, they are automatically assumed to be Filipinos,” he added.
Poe was found in a church in Iloilo. Her adoptive mother, Susan Roces, belongs to the Locsin clan in Negros Occidental. Her adoptive father, action star, Fernando Poe Jr., was a native of Pangasinan.
(With a report from Carla P. Gomez, Inquirer Visayas) SFM