Comelec expects more election protest to be filed

Election Commissioner Lucenito Tagle. Photo from comelec.gov.ph

MANILA, Philippines—The Commission on Elections has been swamped with electoral protests in connection with the recently concluded mid-term elections.

According to Election Commissioner Lucenito Tagle, the Comelec has already received around 60 election protests seeking disqualification of candidates and the annulment of certain victory proclamations.

Among the most prominent petitions lodged with the Comelec was the one filed by actor Ariel “Aga” Muhlach against his opponent, Camarines Sur 4th District Congressman-elect William “Wimpy” Fuentebella.

Muhlach earlier asked the Comelec to annul Fuentebella’s proclamation  and to declare failure of elections in Camarines Sur, saying election returns from several areas were not transmitted due to “corrupted” compact flash cards of the precinc count optical scan machines.

Tagle said he expected  the number of electoral protests to increase in the coming days.

“The cases will be raffled off [to either the First and Second Division of the Commission] … but the cases keep on coming; we may even have over 100 cases,” Tagle said in an interview.

He said the cases involved local candidates, “mostly local official like city mayor, sangguning panlalawigan.”

Asked why he thought many more protests would be filed despite the automation of the counting process, Tagle said the problem may be in the attitude of the candidates.

“I don’t know, maybe some candidates don’t want to accept that they lost… so we really have to check if there was really anomaly involving the PCOS machines,” Tagle said, citing the 2010 elections when most election protests were dismissed apparently for lack of evidence to prove irregularities had been committed.

The Comelec will start the hearing of the electoral protests involving local candidates on June 6.

Another Comelec official earlier said that she expected more electoral protests this year compared with the 2010 elections but but not as many as the Comelec used to receive during the days of manual counting.

“In 2010, we had a total of 96 electoral protests, but we expect more this time,” said Betty Pizana, director of the Comelec’s Electoral Contests Adjudication Department, citing glitches in some PCOS machines.

Saga Mabaning, chief of the Comelec’s Judicial Records Division, said he did not expect the number of cases to exceed the protests filed prior to the computerization of the vote count in 2010.

“The automated election system actually helps prevent the influx of electoral protests. Many people think the manual system was easier to manipulate,” Mabaning added.

Mabaning said the filing fee for an electoral protest costs P10,000 but a complainant may spend half a million pesos for the litigation process.

“Actually, what is really expensive are the lawyers’ fees. But apparently, this doesn’t stop some candidates from pursuing cases to appease or satisfy their constituents or supporters,” the official added.