CEBU, Philippines - Mayoral candidate Marilou Veloso Galenzoga said the May 13 elections in Baybay City in Leyte is still far from over yet because the electronic transmission results was pegged at only 25 percent.
Galenzoga had questioned the Comelec on the validity of the canvassing results, particularly on the remaining 75 percent of the clustered election returns, which she claimed were not electronically transmitted and were instead uploaded to the consolidation and canvassing system (CCS) at the canvassing sites by either using replacement PCOS machines or directly uploading to the CCS.
One CCS staff at Comelec-Leyte provincial office, via a phone call, however said yesterday the transmission of results was already done 100 percent, and this was also confirmed by a staff of Comelec-Baybay office although the latter admitted that 75 percent of the results was transmitted manually.
City election official Susan Collamar was still on leave and was unavailable to explain why the manual transmission, and the eventual proclamation on May 14 of incumbent Mayor Carmen Cari as the winner in the election.
Galenzoga alleged that the electronic transmission of results was incomplete and to do it manually was a violation of Republic Act 8436, as amended by RA 9369, specifically Section 22 on Election Returns (ERs).
The law states: "Within one hour after the printing of the election returns, the chairman of the board of election inspectors or any official authorized by the commission shall, in the presence of watchers and representatives of the accredited citizen's arm, political parties/candidates, if any, electronically transmit the precinct results to the respective levels of the board of canvassers, to the dominant majority and minority party, to the accredited citizen's arm, and to the Kapisanan ng mga Broadcaster ng Pilipinas (KBP)."
It further says: "The election returns transmitted electronically and digitally signed shall be considered as official election results and shall be used as the basis for the canvassing of votes and the proclamation of a candidate."
Galenzoga added that Rule 3 of Section 1 of Comelec Resolution 8804 provides that "the basis of the canvass shall be the electronically transmitted results," thus the manual transmission could not make the ERs official.
With these citations, Galenzoga questioned why the city Comelec still proceeded with the canvassing and eventually proclaimed Cari the winner, even if 75 percent of the results was not electronically transmitted as required by law.
"All the neighboring towns of this city had successfully transmitted the election results electronically. Baybay City did not. Maybe they were hiding something," she alleged.
When asked on the authenticity of the election results, Galenzoga said she could not verify because she was not furnished with a copy of the ERs, and neither was she given a copy of the certificate of proclamation, even if she belongs to an accredited party, the United Nationalists Alliance (UNA), which is entitled to have copies of those documents. (FREEMAN)