Marcos camp to SC: Order Comelec to show contents of ‘unused’ SD cards

MANILA, Philippines – The camp of defeated vice presidential candidate, former senator Ferdinand Marcos Jr. asked the Supreme Court (SC) on Friday to show the contents of the “unused” SD cards from the May 9 polls.

In a six-page manifestation, Marcos through his counsel George Erwin Garcia said, “It is respectfully prayed of this Honorable Tribunal to direct the COMELEC (Commission on Elections) to furnish the protestant and the other interested parties in this case with… the results of the decryption of the SD cards from (1,356) units of contingency VCMS (vote-counting machines), which were found to contain data during the said closure/stripping activities."

The manifestation was filed before SC acting as the Presidential Electoral Tribunal (PET) that is hearing the election protest filed by Marcos.

The former senator lost to Vice President Leni Robredo by a slim margin of 263,473 votes in the final and official tally of votes in the May 9 elections. 

Garcia said the fact that many of the supposedly “unused” SD cards were found to have data during the stripping activities strengthened their position that mere physical examination is not sufficient to prove that they were not used in the May 2016 elections.

According to the lawyer, they refused to participate in the stripping activities conducted on October 26 and November 2 since they believe that the poll body should have secured authority from the PET prior to the activities.

The poll body carried out the stripping activities after it decided to release the 1,356 VCMs to Smartmatic, claiming they were not covered by the Precautionary Protective Order (PPO) issued by SC. The PPO enjoins Comelec to preserve and safeguard all election materials related to the protest filed by Marcos against Robredo.

Marcos' camp said this precluded the Comelec from conducting the VCM stripping without court approval.

“On this score, and in order to guide protestant Marcos on the appropriate course of action to remedy his precarious situation, he would like to request this Honorable Tribunal to direct the Comelec to furnish him and the other interested parties in this case with copies of the Minutes of the Proceedings and/or Transcript of Stenographic Notes taken during the closure/stripping activities conducted on 26 October 2016 and 02 November 2016,” Garcia said. - Kristine Daguno-Bersamina