Solon tells CA: Reject Comelec chief or impeach his opponents

Majority Leader Gerry Espina of the Commission on Appointments asked the CA yesterday to either reject the appointment of Commission on Elections Chairman Alfredo Benipayo and Commissioners Florentino Tuason and Resurreccion Borra, or impeach the four Comelec officials who are opposing the confirmation of the three.

Espina made the drastic proposal after Sen. Edgardo Angara expressed exasperation over the continuing in-fighting among Comelec officials that has paralyzed operations of the poll body.

Angara, chairman of the Senate committee on suffrage and electoral reforms, pointed out that the three appointees and the opposing group of Comelec Commissioners Luzviminda Tancangco, Rufino Javier, Ralph Lantion and Mehol Sadain all agreed last March to submit their position papers on what could be decided en banc and what could be acted upon by the chairman administratively.

"They agreed to submit their papers to us after three weeks. Those three weeks passed weeks ago and we are still waiting for their respective positions," Angara said.

He said that the CA committee headed by Sen. Tessie Aquino-Oreta should not schedule any new hearing for the confirmation of Benipayo, Borra and Tuason until the two opposing groups have submitted their respective position papers.

"We would be a most useless body if we confirm the nominees and then the whole country would see the spectacle of a Comelec that could not perform its functions," Angara said.

He asked Benipayo and the other group to set aside their personal animosities even for a moment and think of national interest so they could come up with the document needed to start the poll body moving.

It was then that Espina made the motion to either reject the three or impeach the four, depending on who they believe is at fault over the paralysis of the Comelec.

The four commissioners were not able to testify against the three in yesterday’s hearing for lack of time. The only one able to testify was George Balagtas, a top official of the Photokina consortium that had won a bidding for the P6.5-billion computerization program of the Comelec.

Balagtas claimed that Benipayo had stonewalled all efforts of his group to continue negotiations on the terms and conditions of the modernization contract. Benipayo, however, denied this and even cited letters of Photokina mentioning their meetings.

Benipayo said he agreed with the stand of former Comelec Chairman Harriet Demetriou that the bidding won by Photokina was null and void and that no valid contract could emanate from it. He also cited the certification from the Department of Finance that only P1.2 billion is available for the Comelec contract.

Balagtas argued that the P1.2 billion pertained only to the year 2000, that the P6.5-billion contract is good for five years. Benipayo, however, countered that Comelec could not compel Congress to appropriate the needed full amount of P6.5 billion since the project is not foreign funded.

"If my refusal to implement the P6.5-billion contract for which there is no fund, is a reflection on my integrity, then I leave that to the good judgment of the Commission," Benipayo said. – Efren Danao