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Friday, March 29, 2024

Comelec junks San Juan election recall petition

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The Commission on Elections Wednesday junked a recall petition seeking to contest the election victory of San Juan City Mayor Guia Gomez for lack of merit. 

In a resolution, six of seven commissioners of the poll body—Chairman Andres Bautista, Christian Robert Lim, Al Parreno, Luie Tito Guia, Sheriff Abas and Rowena Guanzon—voted to dismiss the petition of losing San Juan mayoral candidate Francis Zamora contesting the results of the city’s election.

Guanzon noted the possible recall “cannot take the risk of thwarting the will of the electorate” who voted Gomez into office. 

Commissioner Arthur Lim abstained from voting owing to his relations with the Zamoras. 

Last May, the Zamora camp filed a petition before the local Comelec office seeking a recall for the mayoral post, citing “loss of confidence” to incumbent Mayor Gomez.

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Gomez called the petition a “desperate attempt” by the Zamoras to gain power and insisted the petition would be deemed “defective” by the Comelec.

She also accused Zamora of buying signatures in the guise of financial assistance to gain signatories for his recall petition.

Zamora’s supporters gathered 30,000 signatures of residents who supposedly want another election, and presented it to the Comelec in a bid to unseat Gomez, now on her third and last term as mayor.

The petition alleged that Gomez committed “corrupt acts, incompetence, abuse of power and dereliction of duty.”

Gomez was the common-law partner of former President Joseph Estrada, who was mayor of San Juan for 17 years. Estrada is now the mayor of Manila, and Senator JV Ejercito is their son. JV was also mayor for nine years and congressman of San Juan for three years.

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