Saturday, August 11, 2007 Senate poll court proceedings on Koko protest starts
THE Senate Electoral Tribunal (SET) chaired by Supreme Court (SC) Senior Associate Justice Quisumbing has ordered Senator Juan Miguel Zubiri to respond to the electoral protest lodged by losing opposition candidate Aquilino "Koko" Pimentel III.
Pimentel filed his protest before the SET to nullify the proclamation of Zubiri by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) as the 12th winning senator in the May 14, 2007 mid-term elections.
Zubiri was ordered by the SET to submit his reply within a non-extendible period of 10 days from receipt of the summons, which was received by the senator last August 2.
The SET Executive Committee also directed all concerned provincial election supervisors, provincial prosecutors, provincial treasurers, election officers, municipal and city treasurers, and all other election officials assigned to or serving in the provinces or areas included in the election protest of Pimentel, "to safeguard and preserve the integrity of the ballot boxes and their keys, list of voters, as well as other relevant election documents and materials in connection with the May 14, 2007 senatorial elections."
The Comelec has also been directed to safeguard and preserve all relevant election documents and materials in its custody.
The SET Executive Committee is composed of Quisumbing as chairman with Associate Justice Angelina Sandoval-Gutierrez and Associate Justice Ma. Alicia Austria-Martinez as members. The executive committee of the SET meets in the absence of the six senator members as the Senate has not yet designated its representations at the SET.
In his petition, Pimentel claimed that the election results in 44 municipalities of seven provinces in Mindanao, consisting of 2,658 precincts with a total number of 391,081 votes were "manufactured, padded, fraudulent, altered and distorted."
Covered in the poll protest were votes in 22 municipalities in Maguindanao, seven in Lanao del Norte, three in Shariff Kabunsuan, two in Basilan, two in Sultan Kudarat, four in lanao del Sur and four in Sulu. (ECV/Sunnex)
