MANILA, Philippines – It’s final: Juan Miguel “Migz” Zubiri stays at the Senate.
The Supreme Court has denied with finality the motion of defeated senatorial candidate Aquilino Pimentel III to reconsider its decision rejecting his plea that the Commission on Elections (Comelec) be ordered to accept evidence on alleged cheating in Maguindanao during the May 14, 2007 elections.
In a one-page minute resolution, the Court ruled that Pimentel did not present new arguments to warrant the reversal of its decision of March 13, 2008.
“The Court resolved to deny with finality the motion for reconsideration of the decision of March 13, 2008 filed by counsel for petitioner dated April 9, 2008, as the basic issues raised therein have been passed upon by this Court and no substantial arguments were presented to warrant the reversal of the questioned decision,” read the decision.
On July 4, 2007, Pimentel filed a petition for certiorari and mandamus with an urgent prayer for the issuance of a temporary restraining order or a status quo ante order.
Two months after the elections, the 11 candidates with the highest number of votes were officially proclaimed and took their oaths of office as senators.
The only remaining contenders for the 12th and final senatorial post were Pimentel and Juan Miguel Zubiri.
It was at this time that the Comelec, acting as the National Board of Canvassers (NBC), continued to conduct canvass proceedings to determine the 12th winner in the senatorial elections.
Pimentel assailed the proceedings before the NBC and its constituted Special Provincial Board of Canvassers for Maguindanao (SPBOC-Maguindanao) in which the Provincial and Municipal Certificates of Canvass (PCOC and MCOCs) from the province of Maguindanao were canvassed.
Pimentel objected to the Maguindanao MCOCs on grounds that the proceedings were illegal; the MCOCs were allegedly manufactured, and the results reflected in the MCOCs were “statistically improbable.”
Pimentel said all of his observations, manifestations, and objections through counsel, as well as those by the other candidates’ counsels, were simply noted by the SPBOC-Maguindanao without specific action thereon.
The resulting canvass proceedings were conducted by the NBC and SPBOC-Maguindanao in violation of his constitutional rights to substantive and procedural due process and equal protection of the law, and in obvious partiality to Zubiri, he added.
In his petition, Pimentel said the SPBOC-Maguindanao and the NBC should hear his observations, accept his evidence, and rule on his objections to the Maguindanao MCOCs in what would undeniably be a pre-proclamation case.
In its original ruling written by Associate Justice Minita Chico Nazario, the Court ruled in favor of the Comelec and declared that presenting evidence to prove alleged manufactured MCOCs would be tantamount to a pre-proclamation case prohibited by law.
“Pimentel only made a sweeping claim that in the canvass proceedings of the Maguindanao votes before the NBC and the SPBOC-Maguindanao, he was deprived of his constitutional right to due process, both procedural and substantive,” read the decision.
“After going over his allegations, however, and the definition of substantive due process, this Court finds that Pimentel cannot invoke denial of substantive due process because he is not assailing any law, which, arbitrarily or without sufficient justification, supposedly deprived him of life, liberty, or property.”