SC yet to decide on Marcos' appeal to annul votes in Mindanao -Bongbong camp

The Supreme Court, sitting as the Presidential Electoral Tribunal, has yet to decide on former senator Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr.’s third cause of action which is the annulment of election results from Mindanao, his spokesperson said Tuesday.

Lawyer Vic Rodriguez said what the High Tribunal unanimously dismissed was their second cause of action which is the manual recount and judicial revision.

“Based on the official pronouncement made by the Presidential Electoral Tribunal today, the court unanimously voted to dismiss our second cause of action which is the manual recount and judicial revision,” he said in an emailed statement.

“However, as to the issue on how to proceed with our third cause of action which is the annulment of votes in Mindanao, the Tribunal has yet to decide on the matter,” Rodriguez added.

Earlier in the day, SC spokesperson Brian Hosaka told reporters that the court unanimously voted to junk the protest for lack of merit, nearly five years after it was filed by Marcos on June 29, 2016.

An updated press briefer later issued by the SC stated that the PET dismissed the entire electoral protest.

Marcos, son of the late President Ferdinand Marcos, lost to Robredo by 263,473 votes in the May 2016 elections which the former senator claimed was marred by fraud.

One part of the electoral protest was a recount, revision and re-appreciation of ballots from three provinces he chose: Camarines Sur, Iloilo, and Negros Oriental. After the recount, the PET found that Robredo's lead over Marcos widened by some 15,000 votes.

Marcos then asked the PET for a review of the recount results. Robredo, meanwhile, called for an immediate dismissal of the case, as well as an order for Marcos to present evidence to justify his sought technical examination of voter documents from Lanao del Sur, Maguindanao and Basilan.

The former senator’s so-called third cause of action is the annulment of election results in the three Mindanao provinces because of alleged terrorism and voter intimidation.

He had insisted the case must proceed to the third cause of action independently of the results of the recount.—AOL, GMA News