The lawyer of reelected Lapu-Lapu City Mayor Arturo Radaza yesterday denied that his votes have reached 180,000, which is way beyond the 148,870 total number of voters in the city.
In a press conference, Richard Sison said the Certificate of Votes given to them by the Board of Canvassers revealed that Radaza got only 61,835 votes while his opponent, Vice Mayor Norma Patalingjug, garnered 47,355 votes.
The Certificate of Votes was duly signed by BOC chairman Ann Lamban, vice chairman prosecutor Evangeline Gicale, and Leonilo Oliva, the schools division superintendent in that city.
“The earlier figure of 180,000 has not been verified ambot asa nang nila gikuha,” Sison said.
Sison said the combined number of votes gathered by Radaza and Patalingjug reached 109,090, which accounted for 74 percent of the city’s total registered voters.
Patalingjug’s legal counsel Romeo Igot earlier claimed that the elections in Lapu-Lapu City were tainted with fraud in favor of Radaza, prompting them to file protest before the Commission on Elections.
However, Sison explained that Patalingjug’s accusation has no basis based on the May 18 ruling of the BOC denying the move of Patalingjug’s camp questioning the election returns for being vague and lack of basis.
“The board is fully satisfied on the authenticity of the election returns, and it is not required to look beyond the face of the election return,” the BOC ruled.
“On the election returns where the data is lacking or there is no data at all, the same is only a formal defect and can be cured or corrected by calling on the board of election inspectors to fill up the data needed. This was what was done by the board,” it added.
The issue on the alleged excess of votes in Lapu-Lapu City was not raised during the canvassing of ballots before the Provincial Board of Canvassers.
Provincial election supervisor Lionel Marco Castillano, the board chairman, said if such allegation was true, candidates other than in the city must have already complained during the canvassing.
Candidates for mayor and councilors are no longer included in the provincial canvassing, except for those running for the Senate, Congress and provincial positions.
But Castillano said that during the canvassing, he never noticed any election returns or statement of votes bearing the total number of votes higher than the actual number of registered voters, as alleged by the camp of Patalingjug.
He said nobody raised such issue except for lawyer Edgar Gica, who manifested that there is pending pre-proclamation protest filed by Patalingjug against Radaza.
Patalingjug claimed that there were election irregularities in 157 precincts of the city. — Ramil V. Ayuman and Gregg M. Rubio/LPM