SET ruling ‘extinguished’ DQ case before Comelec – Poe camp

The camp of Senator Grace PoeLlamanzares believes the ruling of the Senate Electoral Tribunal (SET) “extinguished” the alleged election offense of “misrepresentation” in the disqualification case filed by defeated senatorial candidate Rizalito David.

Because of this, Poe’s legal counsel George Garcia said they will move for the dismissal of the election offense case before the Commission on Election (Comelec) Tuesday, December 1 officially informing the poll body of the favorable SET decision.

“We strongly believe that the SET win means there is no misrepresentation in the Certificate of Candidacy (COC) she filed when she ran for the Senate in 2013,” Garcia said in a statement.

Garcia pointed out that no probable cause exists to justify the filing of the case.

In his affidavit-complaint, David claimed that Poe was ineligible “for the office she sought” in 2013 because she is not a natural-born Filipino citizen.

According to David, the neophyte senator violated Section 74 of the Omnibus Election Code, which considers the COC a sworn statement by the person filing it to announce his or her candidacy for a particular office.

Filipino since birth Violation of the said provision can be considered an election offense, which carries a penalty of one to six years of imprisonment, disqualification to hold public office and deprivation of the right to suffrage, David noted.

But the SET, voting 5-4, ruled that Poe, even as a foundling, is a naturalborn citizen and thus qualified to sit as a member of the Senate.

The SET ruled that Poe enjoyed in her favor the presumption that she was born of Filipino parents and that David failed to destroy such presumption by providing that her parents are foreigners.

Majority of the SET members declared that Poe is a natural-born Filipino citizen under the 1935 Constitution and continues to be a natural-born citizen as defined under the 1987 Constitution, as she is a “citizen of the Philippines from birth, without having to perform any act to acquire or perfect [her] Philippine citizenship.”