Unseated

Today, sitting en banc, the Commission on Elections will likely issue writs of executions on three high profile election protest cases. The higher profile enjoyed by these cases is due to the personalities involved.

These three cases involve Bulacan governor Jonjon Mendoza, Isabela governor Grace Padaca and Pampanga governor Ed Panlilio. The electoral protest cases filed against the three went through the long mill of recounting ballots from contested precincts, revalidation of the statements of votes and exclusion of obviously fraudulent returns.

At the end of the long and tedious process, which exhausted all legal remedies, it has been determined that all three had actually lost the last elections. The ends of justice require that they be unseated as soon as possible and replaced by the actual poll winners.

There is, to be sure, a lot of dissonance in the public mind, especially with the cases involving Padaca and Panlilio. The two have been hailed as reformist political personalities. Their respective triumphs were described as quixotic crusades against the long established political blocs in their respective provinces.

Because of that dissonance, it proved too tempting for a few irresponsible voices to declare that there was a Palace-inspired conspiracy to knock-off provincial governors aligned with the Liberal Party. That conspiracy theory is entirely without basis. All the electoral protest cases were filed immediately after the last election — or way before present political alignments took shape.

These irresponsible conspiracy theories serve to undermine public confidence in the independence both of the Comelec and the electoral tribunals overseeing the poll protests from the last elections.

It is testimony to Grace Padaca’s grace that she took the effort to dispel all the conspiracy theories. She stated bluntly that the Palace had nothing to do with the ruling on her case and that the troubles were all due to the vagaries of local politics in her province.

It might be beneath her to cheat. But doing so is certainly not beneath some of her erstwhile political allies. As beneficiary of things done for her, perhaps without her knowing, she cannot be exempted from the penalties for wrong things done. Her unseating is the essential requisite for justice to be served.

Those allies said to be responsible for the fraud are no longer with her. And without them, she might find even more challenging to reclaim the post she appears destined to lose.

I have not kept close track of the electoral protest case filed against Among Ed Panlilio. He seems least likely to use fraud to acquire power. But if fraud is established by the evidence, then he too must vacate his post.

There is vastly less dissonance in the case of Jonjon Mendoza. From the campaign period leading up to the previous elections, his group had freely indulged in some aggressive campaign tactics intending to smear his rival, Obet Pagdanganan.

And so when the results of the Bulacan gubernatorial elections became the subject of an electoral protest, most understood the need to pursue it. Those results did appear tainted.

A careful recount did show Pagdanganan winning over Mendoza. That was established many months ago, after the recount was done. But it has taken painfully long for the Comelec to act with finality in seeing justice done in this case.

Pagdanganan has been proclaimed the real winner in the last elections and the truly elected governor of this province. The long and complicated electoral protest process now means he has barely six months left in the term of office to which he was elected.

Any further delay in the Comelec issuing a writ of execution transferring the post to its rightful occupant will cut the already short balance of the term even more. That will threaten to make the triumph of justice in this case a hollow one.

This is not the first time Pagdanganan is convinced elections where stolen from him.

When he ran for the Senate a few years back, Pagdanganan recalls that his camp was approached by electoral syndicates asking for money to improve his standing to well within the winning column. Confident he had won his seat in the Senate and disinclined to patronize the cheaters, Pagdanganan ignored the offers.

In the final count, he ended up just outside the winning column. Some of his rivals, it seems, decided to buy the post he might have otherwise won in a clean election. Contesting the results of a nationwide poll, however, appeared more expensive than campaigning for the post itself, and Obet decided to chalk up the loss to experience.

On seeking to return to the gubernatorial post he had exemplarily held for three terms before yielding to the unwise provisions regarding term limits, Obet felt the elections were once again stolen from under his nose. This time, he decided not to yield to the occurrence of fraud.

Costly as the process might be, he soldiered on, pursuing his protest and seeing through the recount. His perseverance was rewarded. His conviction that his province mates had not let him down and actually elected him to the post was affirmed by that recount.

Vindicated by his proclamation last month as the true winner of the last elections, he now counts each day that passes before a writ of execution is finally issued as opportunity lost and justice diminished for a province he loves so much.