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When
positions are won without getting elected
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from
NAMFREL Election Monitor Vol.2, No.12
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After the Commission on Elections’
(Comelec) decision on the protest regarding the mayoral race in
Lucena City
– in which the vice mayor is being installed by the Comelec as mayor
(a position he did not run for) – it is now
the turn of the House of Representatives Electoral Tribunal (HRET)
to act on a similar protest case filed against
the representative of the 4th district of Leyte.
It will be recalled that actor Richard Gomez, the husband of TV
personality Lucy Torres-Gomez, filed his
certificate of candidacy as representative in the fourth district of
Leyte for the May 2010 elections, but was
disqualified by Comelec because of residency issues. Lucy
Torres-Gomez substituted for him and eventually
won the race. After the May elections, losing candidate Eufrocino
Codilla, Jr. filed a protest against Lucy Torres-
Gomez before the HRET on the ground that neither Richard nor Lucy
was a legitimate candidate. Since
Gomez’s candidacy was never official, therefore, Torres’ candidacy
was also unofficial since there was no
candidate to substitute for in the first place. Therefore, the
candidacies of the couple should be considered as
invalid. This is the point to which Codilla is giving emphasis and
is now awaiting the HRET’s decision. |
Torres-Gomez appealed to stop the hearing of the protest but HRET
denied it. The incumbent representative
also tried to appeal before the Supreme Court but to no avail. The
HRET now seems geared to hearing the case
any time.
Regarding the Lucena City electoral protest (previously covered
here: http://bit.ly/lw3B37) the Comelec
promulgated a resolution declaring the incumbency of elected mayor
Barbara Talaga as void. Five of the six
Comelec commissioners concurred to declare winning vice mayor
Roderick Alcala as the new mayor of the city.
Earlier, it was reported that the losing candidate Philip Castillo
and elected vice-mayor Alcala filed protests
assailing Barbara Talaga’s proclamation as mayor, citing many
technical issues that allegedly characterized the
decision of Comelec to declare Talaga as an official substitute
candidate for her husband, Ramon Talaga, who
was disqualified for having served as mayor for three terms. |
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The resolution nullifying the proclamation of Ruby Talaga as mayor
was signed by commissioners Rene
Sarmiento, Lucenito Tagle, Armando Velasco, Elias Yusoph and
Christian Robert Lim. Commissioner Augusto
Lagman inhibited, while Chairman Sixto Brillantes filed a dissenting
opinion, maintaining that the election and
proclamation of Barbara was valid and legal, and took note of the
fact that the people of Lucena knew on
election day that her husband had been disqualified from running and
that she had substituted for him in the
mayoral election.
Comelec has already ordered Barbara Talaga to vacate the post and
Roderick Alcala is expected to assume the
position of city mayor.
The Lucena City protest case involves an elected official whose
legitimacy of candidacy was questioned by a
candidate who did not even run for the position that he is now going
to assume, while the case in the 4th district
of Leyte involves a losing candidate questioning the legality of the
candidacy of the winning district
representative. The cases are different, but in both cases, the
legitimacy of the victory of the winning candidates
are questioned, and the result of the election can be overturned by
the respective electoral tribunal, disregarding
the outcome of the voting process.
(Sources: PDI, Journal, PhilStar) |
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