Marcos camp twits Leni on fears of election fraud

The camp of vice presidential candidate Senator Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. on Thursday lashed out at rival Camarines Sur Representative Leni Robredo after she said that she was afraid of getting cheated in the upcoming canvassing of votes.

“We take serious exception to the statement of Congresswoman Robredo, that she is entertaining fears na baka siya ay madaya. Pano pa siya madadaya tapos na yung eleksyon?" said Attorney Jose Amorado, a member of Marcos’ legal team.

Amorado said the congresswoman’s statement was ironic after she earlier claimed that she would win by more than 200,000 votes over Marcos.

“Well, Congresswoman Robredo has already taken the position na tapos na yung election, na siya na raw yung nanalo. So pa'no pa siya madadaya if that is the case?” Amorado said.

“She has her own figures, na kahit daw ibigay yung natitirang boto sa aming kandidato ay panalo na daw siya. Now, we don’t know where she is coming from here,” he added.

Robredo’s camp claimed victory over the weekend, saying that the Commission on Elections tally would show that she would win the elections even if all the votes yet to be canvassed were counted in favor of Marcos.

In an interview with reporters on Wednesday, Robredo said that she was afraid of a repeat of the fraud that allegedly marred the 1986 elections.

Marcos' father and namesake was proclaimed the winner of the elections in February that year. He was deposed in a popular uprising in the same month.

The 1986 cheating incident supposedly occurred during the tabulation of the snap elections between Marcos’ father, the late President Ferdinand Marcos, and the late President Corazon Aquino.

“Sa akin lang ano, sana wala silang binabalak na pandaraya na gagawin sa canvassing. Kasi yung winoworry ko ngayon, klaro naman yung numero pero parang mina-mind condition nila,” Robredo said.

The supposed mind-conditioning that Robredo was referring to was the claim of Marcos’ camp that the senator is leading by over 100,000 votes against her based on 100 out of 108 certificates of canvass (COCs) nationwide that their camp have internally tallied.

Meanwhile, Marcos’ campaign adviser ABAKADA party-list Rep. Jonathan Dela Cruz likewise slammed Robredo over her recent statement that the audit of the Comelec’s central server and transparency servers must be done after the proclamation of the winning candidates.

“Parang bigla yatang nagbago ng posisyon si Congresswoman Leni. Sinabi niya na payag siya sa  system audit at lahat ng technical requirement para magkaroon ng malawakang pag imbestiga. Ngayon ang sinasabi na niya ang dapat may proclamation muna,” Dela Cruz said.

Marcos’ camp had earlier filed a request to the Comelec to allow his team to conduct a system audit following the insertion of a new script or computer command in the poll body’s transparency servers on the eve of May 9, Election Day.

Marcos’ camp had expressed concern that the introduction of the script might have affected the counting of votes as it was supposedly after that time that the votes for the senator stopped coming in and his lead of about one million votes over Robredo began to diminish.

Robredo took the lead over Marcos past 3 a.m. on May 10.

Dela Cruz said unless doubts on the integrity of the Comelec’s vote tally has been resolved, the public might question the proclamation by the Congress National Board of Canvassers.

“Ang nais natin mangyari ay bago pa magkaroon ng official canvass ay maliwanag na lahat. Yung mga agam-agam ng taong bayan ay magkaroon ng kasagutan,” Dela Cruz said.

Amorado meanwhile, assured Robredo that the proposed system audit that their camp intend to do to the Comelec servers would not affect the poll body’s vote tally.

“So much so na kaya itiniming namin yung aming request for system audit is because nothing will be affected anymore, tapos na ang transmission [of votes] e,” Amorado said.

“So it’s about time that Comelec should agree that we audit the system because it will not have any effect anymore on the results,” he added. —NB, GMA News