Loren loses case vs Noli

The Supreme Court, convened as the Presidential Electoral Tribunal, junked yesterday the election protest of Sen. Loren Legarda against Vice President Noli de Castro, citing insufficiency of evidence that she had been cheated in the 2004 elections.

In a 20-page resolution penned by Senior Justice Leonardo Quisumbing, the PET said Legarda’s protests failed to prove that the certificates of canvass (COCs) coming from Lanao del Sur were fake.

In her protest, Legarda claimed the election returns showed her winning but that the COCs which showed De Castro winning were manipulated.

Legarda, who was one of the top vote-getters in the senatorial elections last year, is believed to be preparing for a presidential bid in 2010.

PET also cited Legarda’s failure to continue correcting COCs from other provinces including Lanao del Norte and Surigao del Sur and to pay an additional P3.9 million for the recount of ballots from Cebu, Pampanga, and Maguindanao.

PET said Legarda “had not adequately and convincingly rebutted the presumption that as public documents, the Congress-retrieved ER (election return) copies, used for the proclamation of the protestee (De Castro) by the National Board of Canvassers, are authentic and duly executed in the regular course of official business.”

SC spokesman Midas Marquez said Legarda “effectively abandoned her protest” when she returned to the Senate.

“The entire protest is now deemed dismissed and terminated,” Marquez said.

PET also said it found no conclusive evidence to prove Legarda’s claim of an alleged break-in at Congress, during which the alleged switching of ERs took place.

PET noted that one of Legarda’s witnesses, House Deputy General for Legislative Operations Artemio Adasa, even categorically denied that a break-in or a switching of ERs had occurred in Congress.

“The protestant has been afforded ample opportunity to adduce evidence in her behalf for the First Aspect of the protest but the evidence presented is simply insufficient to convince the Tribunal to render invalid all or even half of the 881,722 votes that protestee had over her in the last elections for Vice-President,” PET said.

‘Something unusual’

Reacting to the PET ruling, Legarda said it was her failure to raise the money to pursue her case that prompted the PET decision.

“Victory has a price. My electoral protest was dismissed because we failed literally to raise the required amount to pursue it,” she said. “But it is one thing to lose a case because of lack of money to sustain it. It is a different story if they cannot appreciate the glaring pieces of evidence of massive electoral fraud. I smell something unusual.

“Certainly, the verdict leaves more questions than answers,” she said.

She said she did not provide the required P3 million because she was elected senator and that she knew that such election case would entail expenses of almost P100 million.

“But the fraud of fake ERs in Lanao del Sur is clear. I fought the good fight and proved the fraud,” she said.

‘Triumph of truth’

De Castro, in a statement, said the PET ruling was a “triumph of truth.”

“This is the triumph of truth, the truth that I won fair and square,” he said. “I thank the Supreme Court for echoing the true voice of the people. From the very beginning I was confident that I received the overwhelming mandate of our people as Vice President,” said De Castro in a statement.

“Again I thank the people for their support,” he added.

De Castro’s camp said in October that the impending dismissal of Legarda’s electoral protest should be based on merits and not just on technicality.

Romulo Macalintal, De Castro’s counsel, said Legarda wrongly accused his client of cheating because she “miserably failed” to prove her allegations of electoral fraud against the Vice President.

“We never doubted nor had any second thoughts that the election protest of Ms. Loren Legarda will be dismissed for its utter lack of merit,” Macalintal said.

“From the very moment we received a copy of her petition on July 23, 2004 up to this date that the PET has rendered its decision dismissing her protest, we were very confident that her protest had no way to go except its apparent and clear dismissal,” he said.

“It is as clear as light that Ms. Legarda’s election protest should be dismissed for its utter lack of merit and for her apparent failure to prove her baseless and careless allegations of massive fraud and massive cheating in the May 2004 polls,” he said.

“In other words, no evidence whatsoever was introduced by Legarda to prove her claim that she won the contested vice-presidential election and that the May 2004 polls were marred with massive fraud and irregularities,” he pointed out.

But Sixto Brillantes, Legarda’s lawyer, said that while he expected the case to be dismissed due to technicality, he was surprised with the PET’s ruling that no fraud was committed against his client.

Brillantes said they presented “very strong evidence” to prove that De Castro won only because of “spurious” election returns.

“While the dismissal may be correct because of technically, we cannot accept the findings of PET. We’ll be filing a motion for reconsideration soon,” he added. - with Pia Lee-Brago, Christna Mendez, Sheila Crisostomo