SC asked: Throw out suit vs Ping

Makati City Rep. Aga-pito Aquino asked the Supreme Court yesterday to nullify the petition filed by Sen. Edgardo Angara that seeks to void the nomination of Sen. Panfilo Lacson as standard-bearer of the opposition Laban ng Demokratikong Pilipino (LDP).

In a 27-page comment, Aquino branded Angara a dictator in his capacity as party chairman. Aquino, the party’s secretary-general, also blamed Angara for the split in the LDP.

The ongoing problems within the Koalisyon ng Nagkakaisang Pilipino (KNP) are merely a duplication of what has been going on within the LDP since Angara took the party’s helm, he added.

"It is this (Angara’s) passion for control that has spawned continuing divisiveness and wrangling within the (LDP) and which cause party stalwarts, (such) as the late Senate president Neptali Gonzales, then Sen. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, Executive Secretary Alberto Romulo (and) former senator Heherson Alvarez, among others, to leave the party," he said.

"It is because of (Angara) that the opposition now appears to be hopelessly divided," Aquino said. "Is this (Angara’s) mission?"

He said the Commission on Election (Comelec) did not err in recognizing Lacson as an LDP presidential candidate, since Angara, as party chairman, does not have the sole right to choose the LDP’s standard-bearer.

The Makati City lawmaker said Lacson is the official LDP candidate for president, since he was nominated by the party’s general membership during their national meeting on Dec. 4, 2003 at the Club Filipino in Greenhills, San Juan.

Aquino said Angara deliberately did not call for a national congress because of his "personal, open dislike" for Lacson.

He also said Angara’s failure to convene a national meeting of LDP’s stalwarts was unfair and malicious inaction amounting to dereliction of the party chairman’s duty.

"It is respectfully submitted that this nomination by the general membership of the party is the substantial equivalent of the party’s national congress — which makes the nomination of Lacson as the LDP’s official... candidate for president," he said.

Aquino added that the Comelec resolution recognizing both Lacson and actor Fernando Poe Jr. as presidential candidates of the LDP only provided a temporary solution to a problem which the parties in the KNP and their respective members can ultimately resolve among themselves.

He said it was only fair to respect the nomination of the LDP’s general membership, since the party chairman refused to consult with the LDP membership due to his "personal bias in favor of desire to support an outsider as candidate for president," in obvious reference to Poe.

Aquino noted the Comelec did not commit grave abuse of discretion in issuing Resolution No. 6453, which said the nomination of candidates can be signed by any party president and chairman, secretary-general, or any duly authorized party officer.

Under the Comelec resolution, the election returns sent to the LDP will have to be split between the Aquino and Angara factions.

Angara earlier called on the Supreme Court to order the Comelec to withdraw recognition of Lacson as the LDP standard-bearer by saying Aquino, as LDP secretary- general, did not have leave or authority to nominate the party’s standard-bearer.

Meanwhile, House Minority Leader Carlos Padilla is still a candidate running under two banners, as he is on the senatorial slate of both LDP and KNP.

Angara and Sen. Vicente Sotto III, Poe’s principal power-brokers, told reporters last week that Padilla had been replaced in the KNP slate by former agriculture secretary Salvador Escudero III.

Padilla, like Aquino, supports Lacson.

For his part, Lacson said he and Poe discussed "many issues" during their meeting Wednesday.

Lacson refused to elaborate on the discussion, but admitted that Poe’s disqualification case was one of the issues they took up.

"We agreed to meet again and help each other, whatever happens," Lacson said. "You know, the situation is very fluid and many things can happen."