STA. ROSA, Nueva Ecija – A few months before the filing of certificate of candidacies for the next year’s polls, the necessity for a computerized election was underscored with a court decision that affirmed the victory of the incumbent mayor here.
This as RTC Branch 27 Judge Angelo Perez ruled that Mayor Josefino Angeles garnered an “absolute majority” of votes over protestant Eliseo Angeles with the former’s 15,984 votes as against the latter’s 12,940 votes, after giving credence to decrypted data from various compact flash cards (CFCs) covering several clustered precincts.
The decision on election protest filed by Eliseo Angeles against Josefino Angeles penned on March 23 also noted that the protestant failed to present evidence of frauds and irregularities that he alleged to have transpired during the May 10, 2010 elections in this municipality.
Perez’s decision was preceded by the Supreme Court’s August 2009 decision which says that “An election contest, unlike an ordinary action, is imbued with public interest since it involves not only the adjudication of the private interests of rival candidates but also the paramount need of dispelling the uncertainty which beclouds the choice of the electorate with respect to who shall discharge the prerogatives of the office within their gift.”
Court records showed that during the hearing, the revision committee observed that ballot boxes in 14 clustered precincts either have their sealing packaging tapes bearing signatures that were “not genuine”, “tapes are not in the same way as they were when previously wrapped” or padlocks cannot be opened by any of the three keys intended for the padlocks.
The Revision Committee also found shoe prints on some ballots from the ballot boxes, it was also noted.
Court records also showed that several ballots were missing.
For instance, in clustered precincts no. 2, only 185 ballots were there contrary to the 484 counted on the minutes of voting (MV) and 456 on election returns (ERs) while in clustered precincts no. 3, some 269 ballots were found as against 558 on MV and 557 on ERs.
No party was blamed for the alleged anomalies on the physical appearance of the ballot boxes, even as court records showed the incumbent mayor won mostly in clustered precincts as determined after printing out decrypted ballot images from the Comelec.
The court noted, however, that the number of registered voters who actually voted in clustered precincts ”was correctly counted by the PCOS machine as further shown by the Election Day Computerized Voters List.”
Eliseo protested results in all the 54 clustered precincts but both parties later agreed on the integrity of the ballots.
Only 14 out of 40 clustered precincts were scrutinized by the revision committee. These include: precinct nos. 2, 3, 5, 7, 8, 13, 19, 25, 26, 39, 40, 42, 45 and 49.
He argued that the decision of the revision committee, saying that the integrity of the ballots and ballot boxes in the said clustered precincts “were preserved” while the protestee claims otherwise.
In its ruling, Judge Perez said that “clearly, the Court has every reason to rely upon the proceedings conducted by the Comelec in ensuring that the decryption of the ballot images of the ballot used in all the fifty clustered precincts are genuine and authentic.”
The court ordered Eliseo to pay the winner P580,000 in actual damages.
