Saturday, September 09, 2006
Exec’s bid to exclude prov’l official from Congress race hits legal snag
IT MIGHT be too early for Technological Skills and Development Authority (Tesda) secretary Augusto Boboy Syjuco to write off Iloilo Provincial Administrator Manuel “Boy” Mejorada as a potential challenger in the 2007 congressional elections in the second district of Iloilo.
That’s because the exclusion case he had filed against Mejorada appears to have hit a major legal obstacle and is not likely to be enforced by the Election Registration Board as Syjuco wants to happen.
On Thursday, Syjuco’s counsel Atty. Cornelio Panes filed a motion for execution with the 13th Municipal Circuit Trial Court (MCTC) with an unusual prayer --- a correction in its dispositive portion.
Panes informed the court that the dispositive portion of the decision handed down by Judge Victorino Maniba Jr. directed the “Board of Election Inspector of Pavia, Iloilo” to cancel the name of Mejorada as a registered voter of Barangay Amparo, Pavia, Iloilo.
This should be “Election Registration Board”, and not the Board of Election Inspector, Panes said as he asked that the court correct its mistake and carry out the exclusion.
But this motion was met with vehement objections from Mejorada who had earlier pointed out this fatal defect in the judgment.
“There’s no way this can be done,” Mejorada said. “The judgment has become final, and the defect is not merely typographical, but substantial.”
Mejorada said it would be improper for the MCTC to modify its judgment after this was upheld on appeal by the Regional Trial Court, Branch 34, under Judge Yolanda Panaguiton-Gavino.
A proper opposition will be filed before the court next week, he said.
Mejorada said his spirits were buoyed by this development after suffering twin setbacks in the MCTC and RTC.
“The fight is definitely not over,” he declared. “It is just starting.”
Mejorada expressed confidence that Syjuco’s wish to “bulldoze the opposition through legal maneuvers will be frustrated at every turn.”
In his motion, Panes argued that “the appealed decision can be corrected by this Court on its own initiative after the same is pointed out in this motion.”
Panes admitted that there is an error in the court decision.
Mejorada said the “Syjuco express train to exclude me as voter seems to have been derailed because of its own haste.”
The dispositive portion is the most important part of the decision, and this is the one part where great care and prudence is put by any judge, he said.
“Hence, the error was really that, an error,” he said.
Mejorada also pointed out that under Republic Act 8189, there is no need for a motion for execution.
“The ruling became final and executory the moment it was affirmed in toto by the RTC,” he said. (Press release)
(September 9, 2006 issue)
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