Palace to ER: Spare us from your trouble with Comelec

MANILA, Philippines - Laguna Gov. Emilio Ramon Ejercito should leave Malacañang out of his battle with the Commission on Elections, a Palace official said yesterday.

Ejercito on Friday ran to the Supreme Court (SC) in a bid to stop a Comelec order removing him from his post due to campaign overspending in last year’s election.

Deputy presidential spokesperson Abigail Valte said it would be better to let the Comelec explain because it was the job of the poll body to look into campaign expenditures.

She said the Comelec would know better the actions it took against officials who supposedly violated the Omnibus Election Code.

“Maybe they should no longer involve us in this,” Valte said, noting that the Comelec found evidence of a transaction or an expense that was more than the limit allowed by the law.

“So maybe they should just answer that and leave us out of an issue that we have nothing to do with,” she added.

Ejercito asked the high court to immediately issue a temporary restraining order halting the implementation of the Comelec resolution that he said was haphazardly issued.

He cited the urgency for action of the SC on his petition, saying he was only given five days or until Monday to secure a halt order before the poll body would enforce its ruling.