SC goes on recess; chances for appeal on poll cases slim

MANILA, Philippines - The Supreme Court (SC) has gone into recess for over a month, leaving slim chances for appeals on election-related cases, including the party-list ruling, to prosper.

SC spokesman Theodore Te said the high court has started its break to allow justices to write their decisions on pending cases.

“The Court is now on recess. The next full-court session will be on June 4,” he said yesterday.

This means the high tribunal will not convene until after the midterm national elections on May 13 and that its controversial rulings and actions on election-related cases would stand until then.

Chief Justice Ma. Lourdes Sereno, however, may opt to call for a special full-court session to resolve pending pleadings of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) regarding cases like the party-list election and the airtime limit on television and radio advertisements of candidates.

“But with just 20 days left before the elections, I don’t think it would be prudent to make radical changes in our orders,” a member of the court told The STAR.

Earlier this month, the SC revised the standards for groups participating in the party-list system and granted relief to 52 groups earlier disqualified by the Comelec in the upcoming polls.

Specifically, the high court removed the previous requirement of the Comelec for groups joining the party-list election to belong to a marginalized or underrepresented sector, which was based on the SC’s ruling in the Ang Bagong Bayani case in June 2001.

It also held that the party-list system should not be exclusive to sectoral groups and must be opened to regional parties and groups and even national political organizations that do not represent marginalized sectors enumerated in the law.

The Comelec was earlier planning to file an appeal of this ruling, even if it immediately complied with the order and started with summary hearings to determine the qualification of the 52 groups.

A disqualified group, the 1 Ang Bagong Alyansang Tagapagtaguyod ng Adhikaing Sambayanan (1 Ang Batas) also filed last week a petition seeking to reset the party-list elections to October to allow the poll body to “rationalize” the system using the new six-point parameters laid down by the court.

The SC, however, has not acted on this plea.

The high tribunal also issued last week a temporary restraining order (TRO) stopping Comelec’s “aggregate time limit” rule on broadcast ads of candidates.

It granted the relief sought in the petitions filed by broadcast giant GMA Network Corp., ABC Development Corp. and re-electionist Senator Alan Peter Cayetano last February.

Comelec also lamented this development as Chairman Sixto Brillantes almost resigned from his post barely two weeks before the polls.

Also earlier this month, the high court flip-flopped on its ruling in the controversial election case between Mayor Emmanuel Maliksi of Imus, Cavite and his rival Homer Saquilayan that had left the Imus City Hall at a standstill a month before their rematch.

In their deliberations last March 12, justices voted 8-7 in favor of Saquilayan and ordered his reinstatement to the mayoralty post. But in summer session in Baguio City last April 11, they reversed their earlier ruling by the same vote and this time favored Maliksi by remanding the case to the Comelec.

Saquilayan has appealed the ruling, but the high court also has not acted on the case before going into recess.

Meanwhile, Bayan Muna party-list group Rep. Neri Colmenares urged the Comelec yesterday to postpone its decision on the qualifications of 52 party-list groups that the poll body had earlier disqualified and to focus on the preparations for next month’s elections.

The May 13 elections are “dangerously close” and the Comelec’s top priority should be to continue preparing for the coming balloting, Colmenares said.

He said the poll body should postpone its planned weeklong marathon hearings on the disqualification cases of the 52 groups.

The commission has so many concerns to attend to, including automation glitches in the conduct of overseas absentee voting, which could be encountered during the voting process here on May 13, he said.

He suggested that the Comelec could appeal the recent decision of the SC returning the disqualification cases of the 52 party-list groups to the poll body. The affected groups had appealed their cases with the SC.

“Preparation for the 2013 elections must be the focus especially in light of issues with PCOS (precinct count optical scan) machines. It is dangerous for the Comelec to be waylaid from intensive preparation for the automated elections and monitoring violations of election laws by candidates,” Colmenares said. – With Jess Diaz