The Commission on Elections (Comelec) on Monday denied the three motions to intervene on a petition to cancel the certificate of candidacy (COC) of presidential aspirant Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr.

In a 13-page order, the poll body’s Second Division junked the motions for intervention separately filed by Rommel Bautista and others; Reynaldo Tamayo Jr. and others; and by the Partido Federal ng Pilipinas (PFP) in connection with the petition filed by Fr. Christian Buenafe and others.

“It shall unduly delay or prejudice the adjudication of the rights of the original parties in the case. If the instant Motion for Intervention is granted, this will necessarily result to unduly delaying the resolution of the main petition,” stated in the resolution promulgated on Dec. 13.

The Comelec also said the Motion for Intervention filed by Bautista’s group, Motions to Intervene and Admit Attached Answers-in-Intervention filed by Tamayo and others, and the Motion for Leave to Intervene with Motion to Admit Attached Answer-in-Intervention filed by PFP, were not admitted and therefore, “treated as mere scraps of paper.”

The poll body said Bautista and others filed the Petition-in-Intervention, 33 days after Marcos filed his COC, which is beyond the mandatory 25-day period prescribed in Section 78 of the Omnibus Election Code (OEC).

“If the Commission (Second Division) shall admit the Tamayo and PFP Motions are considered the same in the resolution of the main case, we would be in effect be according undue advantage to respondent. Allowing the intervention of Tamayo, et al. and PFP necessarily places respondent on unfairly advantageous position,” it added.

It said allowing the petitioners to intervene could also trigger other intervenors to file their own motions for interventions that would require the Comelec to first resolve these motions before resolving the main case.

After deciding on the three petitions, the Second Division said it would no longer entertain future motions for interventions and/or petitions-in-intervention or answers-in-intervention on the case.

On the other hand, Comelec spokesperson James Jimenez said the First and Second Divisions have yet to decide if they will consolidate the cases to avoid conflict in their decisions on the petitions filed against the former senator.

“While there is a possibility that the cases might be consolidated, but so far there is no decision yet, so I guess they have not seen grounds for possible conflict,” he added.

Other petitions filed against Marcos were petitions to disqualify and declare him as a nuisance candidate.

List of candidates

Jimenez said the release of final list of the 2022 polls candidates will depend on the release of pending cases filed against aspirants.
He said they are not yet sure if they will be able to release the official names of candidates on December 15.

“The original expectation was that we will release it by December 15. I don’t know if we will be able to make it exactly December 15 because there are still motu propio petitions against certain candidates which have not yet been resolved,” Jimenez said.

“So we will see. We will still have two days if they will be resolved in which case once they are resolved then we can come out with the list of official candidates,” he added.

Meanwhile, he said aspirants who have expressed verbally their withdrawal but have yet filed anything officially, their names will be in the list.

“Yes (their names will be in the list), a verbal withdrawal, well meaningless as far as the official list is concerned,” he said.

He reiterated that the name of the aspirants will be on the ballot if he/she decides to withdraw after the ballots have been printed.

“Whatever votes received for that particular candidate will be considered stray. We will not withdraw the ballot to remove those who withdrew late,” he said. “So, it will stay there and inevitably people will vote on that name and those votes will be stray.”  (PNA)