Malilong: BOPK took a risk in fielding Arcilla and Andales. Why?

ALVIN Arcilla appears to be on the way out of the Cebu City Council. It’s a strange twist for the would-be four-termer since his ouster became imminent only a couple of days after he took his oath of office, along with the other winning BOPK candidates, before Sen. Sonny Angara.

A similar fate awaits Sisinio Andales, I am afraid. Like Arcilla, he was re-elected last May 13 after having won three earlier consecutive elections. A Comelec division has similarly voided his certificate of candidacy and, like Arcilla, he filed a motion for reconsideration which, however, was not resolved by the commission en banc together with Arcilla’s reportedly because the commissioner in charge of his case was out on leave.

Andales has been quoted as anticipating an adverse ruling on his motion. The dim view is understandable. The facts in his case are exactly the same as in Arcilla’s: he was elected to three consecutive terms, was suspended towards the end of his second term, won in the 2016 elections and filed a certificate of candidacy again for the 2019 elections notwithstanding the three-term limit imposed by the constitution.The Comelec commissioners who unanimously voted to reject Arcilla’s motion for reconsideration are the same people who will decide his case. The prognosis is bad.

Since the likelihood that they will be more accommodating with Andales is very slim, if not nil, Andales will probably appeal to the Supreme Court and ask for the issuance of a restraining order to stop the Comelec from implementing its decision that would in effect replace him with Joel Garganera, the 10th placer in the last elections. That task (securing a TRO) however also appears daunting given Arcilla’s experience.

This is water under the bridge but if only for the purpose of academic discussion, I wonder what made the pair think they could still seek another term and why BOPK gambled by fielding them despite the serious legal questions hounding them. BOPK is known to have very competent lawyers who do their research (Andales is himself a lawyer) and I cannot believe that in the course of their research, they have not stumbled on Aldovino vs. Comelec clarifying the doctrine on interruption.

Besides, it is axiomatic in law that a person cannot be permitted to benefit from his transgression, a point that the Comelec en banc took pains to explain by saying that to allow a suspended third-termer to seek a fourth consecutive term amounts to rewarding him for his misconduct.

An interesting legal question would have arisen if Arcilla and Andales had decided to withdraw from the race during the period for substitution. Would the BOPK or whatever party Arcilla and Andales ran under, have been allowed to substitute them?

Note that they were not qualified to run from the beginning so how can you replace a person who was technically not a candidate? It would have been different, I think, if the pair had “withdrawn” before the expiration of the period for filing a certificate of candidacy but that is only my opinion and I am not an election lawyer.

Trending

No stories found.

Just in

No stories found.

Branded Content

No stories found.
SunStar Publishing Inc.
www.sunstar.com.ph