Church panel looking into poll fraud

The influential Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) has formed a committee that would look into cases of fraud in the last elections in order to improve its election monitoring system in the future.

This was among the resolutions reached in the recent CBCP plenary assembly held over the weekend.

Attending bishops also reiterated an earlier conclusion made by the CBCP that the May 10 national elections were generally peaceful and instances of fraud isolated.

During the event, each bishop was asked to comment whether massive electoral fraud was "observed" in their respective diocese which would have "affected substantially the results" of the hotly contested elections, according to the CBCP statement signed by its president, Davao Archbishop Fernando Capalla.

"With only one or two exceptions, the rest of the bishops answered in the negative," the statement read.

President Arroyo was accused of resorting to "systematic and massive" cheating in beating popular actor and opposition bet Fernando Poe Jr. in the presidential race. — Jose Aravilla, Nikko Dizon