The camp of former Senator Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos said Vice President Leni Robredo should stop accusing the Presidential Electoral Tribunal (PET) “of systematically reducing her votes and casting aspersions meant to debase its integrity.”
“Leni Robredo cheated her way to the Vice Presidency and in this ongoing manual recount and judicial revision, she is attempting to cheat the Filipino people again by trying to change the rules in the middle of the game,” Atty. Vic Rodriguez, spokesperson of Marcos said in a text message.
Rodriguez was responding to the motion for reconsideration filed by Robredo urging the PET to follow the threshold set by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) for the shading of ballots.
The PET, in its ruling last April 10 denying the 25 percent threshold cited Comelec Resolution 8804, as amended by Comelec Resolution 9164, which, it said does not mention the threshold raised by Robredo’s camp.
But Robredo insisted that the Comelec itself informed the PET, through a letter that the threshold to be followed is 25 percent.
Rodriguez, however, said the invocation of the 25 percent threshold is erroneous.
“The election case was filed by BBM June of 2016 and since then jurisdiction of the case is with the PET and no other as provided by Article 8 of the Constitution. Since it is the Rules of the Tribunal that shall apply, her invocation of the 25 percent threshold rule is erroneous as it was made by the Comelec only on 6 September 2016, four months after the elections,” Rodriguez said.
“It is an obvious ploy on the part of the Comelec, then led by the impeached chairman Andres Bautista, to favor Robredo once revision process starts,” he added. /muf