Mayor Reluya counters,accuses complaining candidate of perjury

The May 14 election is over but an election protest filed by the losing mayoralty candidate in San Fernando had forced the winner, and proclaimed mayor, Lakambini Reluya, to counter by charging the protester of perjury.

Reluya filed a complaint at the Provincial Prosecutor’s Office against losing candidate Renee Canoy for allegedly issuing false statements in her electoral protest.

Canoy lost to Reluya (10,330 votes to 10,370 votes) by a close difference of 40 votes only. This prompted Canoy to ask the Comelec for a recount, accusing Reluya of fielding a “nuisance” candidate, Edilberto Canoy, allegedly to spoil the votes bearing the name Canoy only.

Canoy also filed with the Comelec a formal objection against the inclusion of the election returns of precinct no. 88-A in barangay Panadtaran of the town.

In his complaint, Canoy added documents alleging that the other losing mayoralty candidate, Erico Enad, claimed of receiving 32 votes but the certificate of votes only reflected 19 votes.

Reluya, however, accused Canoy of perjury when the latter made a “willful and deliberate assertion of falsehood” in stipulating, in her objection, a figure that differed from that in the certificate of votes.

Before filing the perjury complaint, Reluya asked the court to rule first on the validity of the protest of Canoy while holding in abeyance the recount of ballots from the town’s 155 precincts.

Reluya argued, through her lawyer Casiano Lomotos Jr, that Canoy’s protest was insufficient in form and substance because it failed to specify what precincts where the alleged fraud and irregularities took place.

Under the Revised Rules of Procedure, insufficiency in form and substance is a ground for the immediate dismissal of a protest, contended Reluya. —Joeberth M. Ocao/RAE