Leni given 10 days to answer Marcos protest

The Supreme Court (SC) sitting as the Presidential Electoral Tribunal (PET) on Tuesday gave Vice President Leni Robredo 10 days to respond to the election protest filed by Sen. Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. and at the same time ordered the Commission on Elections to preserve the election returns (ER) that were the subject of the protest.

SC spokesperson Theodore Te said a high court resolution ordered the issuance of a summons to Robredo “and [to] grant the prayer of the protestant for a precautionary protection order pursuant to Rule 36 of the 2010 Rules of the Presidential Electoral Tribunal.”

The precautionary protection order directed the Comelec to retrieve and preserve the ERs in question for a manual recount, judicial revision and technical examination.

The PET resolution was issued as Marcos filed an omnibus motion for issuance of precautionary order, summons and retrieval orders over his election protest.

Marcos’ lawyer, George Erwin Garcia, argued in the motion that the proclamation of Robredo as the duly elected Vice President was null and void because the certificates of canvass generated by the consolidation and canvassing system were not authentic, and may not be used as a basis to determine the number of votes the candidates for Vice President received.

Marcos also asked the PET to have all the ERs from 36,465 clustered precincts during the May 9 elections subjected to a manual recount, technical examination and judicial revision. Estrella Torres