VP ballot recount starts Feb

THE Supreme Court, sitting as the Presidential Electoral Tribunal (PET), will start in February 2018 the recount of votes for vice president in three contested provinces, in connection with former senator Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr.’s electoral protest.

Romulo Macalintal, counsel for Vice President Maria Leonor “Leni” Robredo, said on Wednesday the collection of ballot boxes and the corresponding “revision” of ballots would start in Camarines Sur, to be followed by those in Iloilo and Negros Oriental.

“Collection of ballot boxes in Camarines Sur alone will start on January 22. Examination of ballots is expected to start mid-February,” said Macalintal during the weekly Kapihan sa Manila Bay forum at Cafe Adriatico in Ermita, Manila.

Macalintal said the process would be important in determining the number of unaccounted votes as a result of human error, not machine error.

Common human errors include checking instead of shading the oval corresponding to the name of the candidate, which is not counted by the vote-counting machine.

During the revision of ballots, both parties will have the opportunity to claim as valid votes

those ballots with check marks or half-shaded ovals, cast for either Marcos or Robredo.

“These [ ballots] are what we called ‘claimed ballots’ under the Intent Rule Doctrine, meaning there was an intention on the part of the voter to vote for this particular candidate,” he added.

“And in all decisions made by the Supreme Court, [votes with] check marks or any indication that there was the intention of the voter to vote for a particular candidate, [are] considered valid votes.”

‘No miracle for Marcos’

Macalintal expressed confidence the revision of the contested ballots in the provinces of Camarines Sur, Iloilo and Negros Oriental would only confirm that Robredo, who ran as vice president to Liberal Party standard- bearer Manuel Roxas 2nd, won fair and square against Marcos.

He claimed Marcos won’t be able to overturn Robredo’s - sion because Robredo would also have her share of “claimed votes.”

Robredo got 664,190 votes in Camarines Sur against Marcos’ 41,219. Robredo also beat Marcos in Negros Oriental, 255,598 to 66,506; as well as in Iloilo,

“In this case miracle will not happen for Mr. Marcos,” Macalintal stressed, adding that “nobody has won in the recount of ballots since the [start] of the automated election in 2010 until now, because counting machines do not commit mistakes.”

“Those who claim that something went wrong during the counting of votes were candidates who cannot accept defeat or pretend to be knowledgeable about the elections,” he added.

In October, Marcos said he lost about four million votes in last year’s automated elections.

“We are very sure that when the recount begins, the real results will vote count of the previous elections was wrong,” he said.

The Marcos camp accuses Ro - sive electoral fraud, anomalies and irregularities” such as the pre-shading of ballots, pre-loaded data storage cards, misreading of ballots, malfunctioning votecounting machines, and an “abnormally high” unaccounted votes or “undervotes.”