Ermita denies withdrawing electoral protest

Batangas vice gubernatorial candidate Edwin Ermita has denied that he has withdrawn his electoral protest with the Commission on Elections against Mark Leviste for alleged massive fraud in the May 2007 polls. 

In a press conference at the Peninsula Manila in Makati City, Ermita, together with his legal counsel Jorge Erwin Garcia, said he, in fact, has no plans of withdrawing his protest against Leviste, contrary to what the latter had claimed.

Leviste, according to Garcia, claimed during a flag-raising ceremony at the Batangas provincial capitol that Ermita, son of Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita, had withdrawn his electoral protest, thus conceding defeat to him.

A week ago, Leviste reportedly distributed an unofficial, typewritten copy of the supposed Comelec results entitled “Overall results of the revision of ballots, Ermita vs Leviste, EPC No. 2007-66 as of March 2, 2008” stating that Leviste was supposedly leading Ermita by 24,863 votes in the revision of ballots.

“Actually, the term withdrawal was used only as a legal term, stating that we already stopped our side in the revision (of votes) but not withdrawal from the whole proceedings,” Ermita told reporters.

Garcia said they requested for a stop to the revision because out of the 5,619 “contested ballots” they had submitted, 3,517 were confirmed as fraudulent, prompting them to conclude that there was no longer any use to recount the remaining contested ballots.

“Our withdrawal should not be misconstrued as if we have already lost. We stopped checking the remaining un-revised (ballots) because we are already satisfied with the results of the revision that clearly showed that the 3,517 ballots were indeed fraudulent,” Garcia said.

Garcia revealed that the Leviste camp earlier filed a counter-protest for the revision to continue, but later withdrew it after at least 1,200 ballots had been counted.

Official Comelec results showed that Leviste garnered 334,847 votes compared with Ermita’s 316,578 votes.

Trailing in the count were actor Christopher de Leon, Praxedes Bustamante and Fortunata Magsombol.

The poll body, however, later approved Ermita’s petition to declare a failure of elections in the towns of Sto. Tomas and Taysan.

Ermita accused Leviste and re-electionist governor Armando Sanchez of buying votes, torching a polling precinct, and using government vehicles in their campaigns.

Ermita accused the Leviste camp of spreading erroneous information that he (Ermita) will soon be proclaimed as the vice governor, allegedly with the help of his father, Executive Secretary Ermita.