The camp of former senator Ferdinand Marcos Jr. on Friday branded the position of the Commission on Elections opposing the 50-percent threshold rule in the revision of votes in the vice presidential election in 2016 as “not only patently illegal but at best meant to justify the cheating done to favor” Vice President Leni Robredo.
Marcos is contesting the result of the vice presidential election in 2016 that Robredo won and has demanded a recount, claiming Robredo’s camp had cheated.
In other developments:
• The camp of Vice President Leni Robredo on Friday slammed Marcos spokesman Vic Rodriguez over his accusations that the Comelec was a “co-conspirator” in the alleged cheating in the 2016 vice presidential election.
“It’s laughable how Mr. Marcos and his spokesperson seem to be pulling every stunt out of the Cheater’s Playbook, getting more desperate in the face of proof that they are lying to the public,” Robredo’s legal adviser Barry Rodriguez said in a statement.
• Senator Paolo Benigno Aquino IV said he was confident the Presidential Electoral Tribunal would do the right thing in the election protest filed against Robredo now that the Comelec had spoken on the issue of the 25-percent threshold.
“With no less than the Comelec saying that the 25-percent threshold should be used in the manual recount, we expect the PET to use it as a guide in making the right decision,” said Aquino, campaign manager of Robredo in the 2016 elections.
Rodriguez said they were not at all surprised with the Comelec position backing Robredo’s plea for the reversal of the ruling of the Supreme Court, acting as Presidential Electoral Tribunal, that set the 50-percent shading threshold for the validity of the votes in the ongoing recount of the votes in the vice presidential election.
“As it was made suspiciously four months after the May 2016 elections and as an afterthought in support of Robredo’s belated assertions, Comelec’s position on the threshold percentage is not only patently illegal but at best meant to justify the cheating done to favor Mrs. Robredo and sway the public opinion to generate support on her continuing attempt to cheat even more,” Rodriguez said in a statement.
“The conspiracy is so clear and the co-conspirator is not expected to admit it.”
Rodriguez said the purpose of the election protest filed by Marcos against Robredo was primarily to question how the Comelec, then under Chairman Andres Bautista, had misconducted the election, undertaken a false canvassing and manipulated the transmission of the results in favor of the vice president.
“By Comelec’s own admission that it is only the Supreme Court, sitting as the Electoral Tribunal, that has sole and exclusive jurisdiction to try and decide cases involving the qualification, election and returns for the position of vice president, it had effectively divested itself of any legal standing to rule on any matter pending before the PET,” he said.
In a 13-page comment, the poll body insisted on the 25-percent shading threshold it used in the canvassing of the votes cast during the May 9, 2016 elections as stated in its Minute Resolution No. 16-0600 that was submitted to the PET by Robredo’s camp for her appeal. With Rio N. Araja and Macon Ramos-Araneta