SAN JOSE, CAM. SUR – Hearing of the election protest filed by losing mayoralty candidate Antonio Chavez against Mayor Gilmar Pacamarra has started and the revision of ballots in 16 contested precincts will commence within the next few days.
Chavez who ran under the Liberal Party-Drilon wing lost by only 5 votes to NPC bet Pacamarra, son of former Mayor Gil Pacamarra.
According to RTC Judge Jose Sarcilla who presides at RTC Branch 58 in this town meantime that no replacement has been appointed for the post vacated by retired RTC Judge Eufronio Maristela, the election protest will be decided within six months pursuant to Supreme Court Circular No. 07-4-15. Judge Sarcilla is executive judge at RTC Branch 31 at Cadlan, Pili within the Provincial Capitol Complex.
Hearing of the election protest was delayed for several weeks after Chavez filed a pre-proclamation protest and an annulment of proclamation case with Comelec. But Comelec was able to rule on both cases only after proclamation of all candidates in the country was completed.
Comelec subsequently dismissed all cases filed not based on merits or demerits but because it said if all election cases are placed in the jurisdiction of regional trial courts, they could be more speedily resolved in view of the new Supreme Court mandate.
Judge Sarcilla said that under the Supreme Court circular all means to delay proceedings in election cases are no longer allowed.
It will be recalled that here in Camarines Sur Bula Mayor Benjamin Decena won in his 2004 election protest case against Mayor Rolando Canet but was able to assume only one week before the May, 2007 election.
The Decena case may have partly triggered the Supreme Court circular.
