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SC TROs on poll betting are being ‘promptly responded to by the Comelec.

The Commission on Elections (Comelec) announced on Wednesday that it is responding to the Supreme Court’s temporary restraining orders (TROs) granted in the instances of candidates in the May 2022 elections.

“We participate every time a TRO is sent to us and we are requested to comment. We’re involved in the process of resolving these concerns. Those cases do not go unnoticed. It’s only that we needed to get started printing, which we accomplished. We’re going to print a lot. In an online discussion on Wednesday, Comelec spokesperson James Jimenez said, “We’re going to print over 65 million ballots.”

When it comes to polling preparations, Jimenez stated that they are sticking to schedules.

“If we wait any longer, we might have problems in the future.” In other words, we may have to crash timelines. We may need to get things along more quickly, and when you move things along more quickly, a lot of things fall by the wayside… “We hope the Supreme Court (SC) recognizes the importance of this case to us and is fully aware of the timelines we are working under,” he said.

Jimenez was replying to election lawyer Romulo Macalintal’s claim that the poll authority may have overstepped its jurisdiction by continuing to produce ballots despite the high court’s TROs.

The Comelec en banc had already designated 13 party-list organizations, one vice presidential hopeful, and one senatorial aspirant to be nuisance candidates, but the SC granted them relief.

“Everything for the preparations for the printing of the votes was done last Sunday, and ballots had already been serialized at that point.” The ballots already had serial numbers attached to them. The ballot faces had previously been corrected and were ready to be used. It was either we went ahead or we didn’t go ahead at that point. We’re sticking to a timeline because we’re worried that if we don’t get started right away, we’ll have problems later,” he explained.

Macalintal also quoted a Comelec statement stating the ballot printing for the May 2022 elections began much earlier than the ballot printing for the May 2019 elections, which began on February 9, 2019, and ended on April 26, 2019, well ahead of the May 2019 elections.

“I simply want to stress out that this is a presidential election, whereas 2019 was a senatorial election, so things are a little more tricky this time.” And this time, we’re talking about more voters, which means you’ll have a lot more allocations to deal with, so the situation is a little different,” Jimenez explained.

One of those affected, according to Macalintal, was Norman Marquez, a senatorial candidate who had previously been disqualified by the Comelec for supposedly being a “nuisance candidate.”

On January 19, the Supreme Court issued a TRO ordering the Comelec to cease enforcing its ruling in Marquez’s case and to respond to his appeal within a non-extendible 10-day period. Despite the fact that a TRO had been issued, his name was not on the ballot.

Marquez characterized the Comelec’s conduct an “arrogant defiance” of the TRO in a letter to Chief Justice Alexander Gesmundo.

Before printing the ballots, the poll body should have informed the SC that it could no longer respect its TRO and should have sought permission from the SC to print the ballots notwithstanding the existence of the TROs on certain candidates, according to Macalintal.

“Rather than merely declaring “the ballots are ready to go, thus we went ahead,” which effectively defied the court’s restraining orders, the Comelec had all of the time to seek such clarity from the SC and tell the court of its decision to begin printing the ballots,” he stated.

Meanwhile, Jimenez stated that the issue in the Partido Demokratiko Pilipino–Lakas ng Bayan (PDP-Laban) between the two sides is the “status quo.”

Between Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi’s side and the cluster of Senators Manny Pacquiao and Aquilino Pimentel III, the poll body was requested to establish who is the authentic organization.

“The PDP-Laban case is currently on hold, which is why we have not declared independence from their rival slates.” So they’re both allowed to use the party name; whether or not that will change in the future, I’m not sure,” he said.

Cusi’s camp filed a petition with the Comelec, requesting that the group of Pacquiao and Pimentel be declared invalid.

Both factions claim to be legitimate leaders of the ruling political party.

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