SC junks Tolentino bid to stop proclamation

Losing senatorial candidate Francis Tolentino. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO/GRIG C. MONTEGRANDE

THE SUPREME Court en banc on Tuesday threw out a suit filed by losing senatorial candidate Francis Tolentino who sought to stop the Commission on Elections (Comelec) from proclaiming the last three winning senatorial candidates due to alleged irregularities in the automated vote count.

“The court dismissed the petition for certiorari, prohibition and mandamus with prayer for temporary restraining order for being moot and academic,” Supreme Court spokesperson Theodore Te told a press briefing.

Tolentino, the 13th placer in the senatorial race, filed the petition last May 18, a day before the proclamation of all 12 winning senatorial candidates by the Comelec.

The former Metropolitan Manila Development Authority chair accused the poll body of allowing a foreign national access to the Automated Election System (AES) and introducing into it unauthorized changes via a new script and hash code.

Tolentino was referring to Marlon Garcia, an official of Comelec’s automation service provider Smartmatic Inc., who claimed the “cosmetic change” he made last May 9 was only meant to correct the appearance of the letter “ñ.”

“The authorized manipulation of the AES has compromised the results of the senatorial elections, in particular the rankings of the 10th to 12th winning candidates, such that the proclamations of the winners  for [those] positions should be held in abeyance pending full, independent, and credible determination of the effects and consequences of such manipulation,” Tolentino’s petition stated.

Aside from Comelec, Tolentino named as respondents in his suit the three candidates occupying the 10th, 11th and 12th places in the vote counts:  Valenzuela City Rep. Sherwin Gatchalian, former Senator Ralph Recto and former Justice Secretary Leila de Lima.

Tolentino asked the high court to order the Comelec to open the AES to forensic audit and investigation to determine the nature, extent, effect and consequences of the authorized manipulation and to make public the results of the audit and investigation.