Marcos protest: The most voluminous in election cases for having 20,000 documents—election lawyer

Photo: Bongbong Marcos/Facebook

MANILA—For having the most number of annexes numbering to more than 20,000 documents, the election protest filed by former Sen. Ferdinand Marcos Jr. against Vice President Leni Robredo is the bulkiest election case ever filed in any election tribunal in the country.

“This is unprecedented in the annals of political cases in our country,” noted election lawyer Romulo Macalintal said in a statement.

Macalintal opined that it might be the reason why the Supreme Court (SC) decided to deliberate the case this week instead of last week.

“This could be the reason why the Supreme Court, acting as the Presidential Electoral Tribunal (PET), deferred any action on the said case when it was included in the tribunal’s agenda last week and instead to take it up again this coming Tuesday in its en banc session,” he said.

The election lawyer added, “For sure, it will take more time for the 15-member PET to study each and every page of the 1,000-page protest and the 20,000 annexes before it could take appropriate action thereon.

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Marcos, a vice presidential candidate in the May 9 national elections, has questioned Robredo’s proclamation.

Meanwhile, Macalintal also noted that the protest of Marcos calling for failure of election in several provinces, where he protested all the clustered precincts in such areas, is an erroneous stand.

“This is an erroneous stand because when the results of election in all the clustered precincts in one area are protested or assailed, it is already tantamount to calling for a failure of election as held by the Supreme Court and the Commission on Elections (Comelec) in various cases,” he said.

The lawyer pointed out that such case is not within the jurisdiction of the PET but of the poll body.

“Failure of election is not within the jurisdiction of the PET since it is the exclusive jurisdiction of the Comelec En Banc under Section 14 of Republic Act No. 7166,” he said.

Macalintal added, “Likewise, ‘failure of election’ means ‘no one is elected,’ hence, there could be no failure of election since the President down to the last councilors were duly elected and had already assumed their respective offices.”

At the same time, he said that the PET should rule if the protest is sufficient in substance since the process would involve expenses.

“Thus, to prevent this, it is imperative for the PET to first make a judicial determination if Marcos’ protest is sufficient in substance or if he is really asking for a recount or a declaration of failure of election,” Macalintal added.

He said that the respondent and her lawyers might find it difficult or be pressed for time to answer said protest since PET Rules only give Robredo 10 days from receipt of the PET order to answer the protest.

“With the unusual length of said protest and its exceptionally voluminous annexes of more than 20,000 documents, the 10-day period to answer said protest would not be sufficient for Robredo and her lawyers to read and answer such lengthy and voluminous petition and annexes,” Macalintal explained.

He added, “Thus, the PET members would likewise require additional time to study the 20,000 voluminous affidavits and documents attached to the more than 1,000-page protest of Marcos before Robredo could even be required to answer, considering the thousands of other cases still to be resolved by the SC.”