Comelec abides by SCOTP decision qualifying Sen. Grace Poe’s presidential run

2016_0207_andres-bautista

The Commission on Elections (Comelec) will abide by the ruling of the Supreme Court of the Philippines (SCOTP) declaring Senator Grace Poe as qualified to run for president in the May 9 elections.

“After all that we have said and done, we did our part, we did our job. The Supreme Court, since it has ruled on the matter, we have to respect it,” said Comelec Chairman Juan Andres Bautista in a press conference.

For his part, Commissioner Arthur Lim said the poll body en banc would discuss whether or not it will file a motion for reconsideration.

Lim congratulated Poe for getting a favorable decision from the SC but is worried over the possibility of setting a legal precedent.

On Tuesday, the High Tribunal, voting 9-6 ruled that Poe is qualified to run for president despite questions on her citizenship and residency requirement.

Earlier, the poll body had cancelled the Certificate of Candidacy (CoC) for President of the lawmaker for failure to meet the legal requirements of running for their position.

Majority decision has four concurring and 5 dissenting opinions of justices

Meanwhile, the majority decision of the Supreme Court (SC) en banc on Tuesday will have four concurring and five dissenting opinions which paved the way for Senator Grace Poe-Llamanzares toqualify in the run for president in the May 9, 2016 elections.

“I am authorized to say that there will be four concurring opinions to the Majority Decision, and five dissenting opinions,” SC Public Information Office (PIO) Chief and Spokesman Atty. Theodore O. Te said in a statement on Tuesday.

Te added that “since the Court has only authorized the release of the vote, it may not be safe to report which ground the Court ruled upon and used as basis for the vote, i.e., between citizenship and residence.”

“Thus, it may be best to simply say, the SC grants Senator Poe’s petitions, 9-6, allowing her to run for the presidency,” Te said. (PNA reports)

*26

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *