Omission

Two of my golfing buddies had a rough time with electoral protests they filed immediately after the last elections. Although both had clearly won the ballot recount, justice remained elusive because of, well, the justice system.

Both electoral protestors, ironically, enjoyed high political profiles and might normally be expected to wield enough clout to protect their interests. Angelito Sarmiento had served as mayor of San Jose del Monte as well as presidential adviser on agricultural development. Roberto Pagdanganan served, over the years, as governor of Bulacan, Secretary of Agrarian Reform and chair of the Philippine International Trading Corporation.

After a long wait, Sarmiento was finally installed as the rightful mayor of San Jose del Monte. The electoral protest was long and grueling. Even after a decision on his electoral protest was promulgated with finality, enforcement required a long wait. Two weeks after he was installed, he holds office outside his own city hall because the other claimant to the post refuses to yield. He has chosen to dig in while trying to uncover other dilatory tactics to prolong the case.

Pagdanganan has had an even rougher time.

After the elections for governor of the province of Bulacan was marred with widespread fraud, he demanded that proclamation of the winner be postponed until after an honest count was done. His plea was ignored. His rival was proclaimed.

He had no other option, in quest of justice, but to file for a recount. The recount was not easy. Shortly after the 2007 elections, the room where ballot boxes for Bulacan province were stored was hit by a mysterious fire. Many other election-related documents went missing.

Despite all these, the recount of valid ballots cast in the province established that Obet Pagdanganan enjoyed an insurmountable lead of 46,000 over the proclaimed governor of the province, Joselito Mendoza. The revision of the ballot count was completed by the Comelec July 28, 2008 — or a little over a year after the last elections.

From then on, the wrongly proclaimed governor Joselito Mendoza used every dilatory tactic lawyers could imagine to prevent the duly-elected governor from assuming the post.

First, Mendoza filed a counter-protest. This meant that more ballots in more municipalities had to be recounted. When Pagdanganan’s lead continued to widen in the course of the additional recount, Mendoza withdrew his counter-protest.

Lawyers for both Mendoza and Pagdanganan formally offered their evidence before the Comelec division handling this case. February this year, the case was considered submitted for resolution. One month after that, on March 27 this year, Mendoza suddenly filed a motion for suspension of further proceeding on the case.

That was a strange move. All proceedings have been completed. There was nothing to suspend.

The lawyers for Pagdanganan, the Comelec and the solicitor-general agree that the motion was improper. Time had run out for such a move. The matter was entirely in the hands of the Comelec as the exclusive adjudicating authority.

Nothwitstanding, Mendoza sought relief from the Supreme Court. His plea ran against every precedent case. It had no basis and should have been thrown out on mere technicality.

Surprisingly, however, the Chief Justice issued a ruling on the same day that the plea was filed ordering a “status quo ante” on the issue of who is the rightful governor of Bulacan province. That order effectively stops the Comelec from issuing a resolution on the case of Pagdanganan v. Mendoza. The whole matter is thrown into some sort of purgatory.

The usual expectation is that such an order from the Chief Justice holds for 90 days. Within that period, the High Court should deliberate the petition and appreciate its merits.

More than 90 days have passed since the Chief Justice stepped into this case. The Court, in similar electoral protests such as the one involving the election of the sitting governor of Pampanga province, has indicated it wants to speed up resolution since the next election was looming closer on the horizon. But in the case of the contested Bulacan gubernatorial elections, the Court has been dragging its feet.

Since there is no other higher judicial authority than the Supreme Court itself, the adversely affected party in this case can only sit and wait. It is entirely at the whim of the Chief Justice to include or exclude the item in the agenda of the tribunal sitting en banc.

By plain omission, the High Court can condemn the adversely affected party into some sort of juridical purgatory. There is no way lawyers for the aggrieved party, who are mere officers of the Court, to ask their superiors to hurry up and act on this case. I suppose there is also no way associate justices can force the Chief Justice to put on the agenda for deliberation a “status quo ante” order that may be issued at whim.

Every day that passes is an injustice. An unelected governor sits and presides over the fate of one entire province. That is, I suppose, an injustice to the entire province no less.

The automation of the next elections might indeed speed up the count. But will it also speed up adjudication, especially when the High Court can preempt the adjudicatory authority of the Comelec?

I hope the High Court might find some time, before the next elections make the matter entirely academic, to deal with this matter. In the meantime, Obet Pagdanganan has found some time for golf and now beats me with impunity. That makes me an interested party in this case.