Respondent_Motion for Reconsideration

8/13/2019 Respondent_Motion for Reconsideration

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Motion for Reconsideration of the Decision Made on the Extension of Elections

In response to the decision made by the Student Judicial Court regarding the appeal of Yu et

al. to extend the elections, the Commission on Elections would like to appeal for a reconsideration of

the decision made on the extension of elections based on the following reasons.

Due Process

The Commission would like to argue that due process in the filing of the appeal was not

followed. The Commission would like to quota the decision made on Case No. 2013-001.

The issue at hand is an issue of due process. The Court has always upheld that each

side in the current suit be given the opportunity to be heard. In Ocampo v.Ombudsman (2000)1, the Supreme Court of the Philippines ratiocinated that:

The essence of due process is an opportunity to be heard. One may be heard, notsolely by verbal presentation but also, and perhaps even many times more creditablyand practicable than oral argument, through pleadings. In administrative proceedings,moreover, technical rules of procedure and evidence are not strictly applied;administrative due process cannot be fully equated to due process in its strict judicialsense. (emphasis ours)

The initial appeal was sent via e-mail by Ryan Yu to the Commission on Wednesday,

February 19, 2014 at 12:18pm. At 5:36 pm, Chief Commissioner Denise Olondriz received a text

message from Magistrate for Audit Danielle Gaite, asking for a copy of the Commissions decision on

the appeal sent by Yu et al. Previously, at 3:53 pm, Chief Commissioner Olondriz sent Mr. Yu a text

message saying that the Commission does not see their reasons as sufficient bases for extension.

However, during this time, no official statement or document containing the reasons for the decision

has been sent to the concerned parties. The official statement was only given to Mr. Yu at 8:00 pm.

Before this time, it can be argued that Mr. Yu should not have been able to appeal to the Student

Judicial Court about the Commissions decision as a complete decision was not yet provided. Hence,

the Commission was not given an opportunity to be heard before Mr. Yu filed an appeal. The

Commission would like to argue that due process was not followed.

Insufficient Time and Disenfranchisement of 1200 Affected Students

The argument posed by Yu et. al. about the Commissions computation is invalid for the

following reasons.

First, they said that the computation should not have excluded the 1200 students who were

affected since they also would have theoretically voted from Wednesday to Monday. However, they

also argued that these students, as being directly affected, were disenfranchised to vote. Hence, their


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argument that these people should have also lined up, voted without their votes being counted, thus,

taking up computer time, should not be accepted. To further discuss this, we pose the following

arguments:

(1) The extension, in theory, should have only been for the students who have voted butwhose votes were not counted. The extension, then, is a time for them to cast their votes

for a second time. However, this extension was not only given to them but all the 1200

students who did not vote at all during the regular election dates. Again, the Commission

would argue that this gives sufficient time for those from these courses who were

disenfranchised from voting in the first place. Also, since this extension is also applicable

to them, they would not have taken up the voting time for other unaffected students.

(2) If Yu et. al. argues that these students were disenfranchised from voting, then,theoretically, they would not have lined up, thus, not taking up the time for other students

to vote. Hence, a separate computation should be made for them because it is a special

case.

(3) Even if it is arguable that they took the time to vote for Wednesday to Friday during thetime that they did not yet know about the system failure, by Monday, the effects of such

system error would already have applied to them. Thus, making some of them, as Yu

argues disenfranchised.It would be difficult and cumbersome to try to determine how

much of these students voted for the first 2 and a half days. Treating them differently

would paint a much more accurate picture than treating all of them the same way.

From the above arguments, the Commission stands by its computations. The Commission

would like to reiterate that the computations presented in the appeal by Yu et. al. are inaccurate and

oversimplify the said situation.

Aside from the first argument, the Commission would also like to argue that the numbers

used in the computations are not static. As stated in the computation, the voters can vote for 8 hours

per day. However, as the Commission has already previously mentioned and would like to expound

on, these 8 hours are not static. The rule that the Commission goes by is that if there are still voterslined up by 5:00 pm, all of these voters would be accommodated. Hence, theoretically, if by 5:00 pm,

20 voters were still in line to vote, (given that each of them would vote for 3 minutes) an additional 60

minutes would be allotted to accommodate these voters. Furthermore, if voters were voting at 5:00 pm

and have not yet submitted the votes by 5:00 pm, the poll officers would not tell them to stop voting

since time is up. Eight hours of voting per day, then, could extend up to 9, 10, 11, or whatever time it

takes to accommodate the people lined up and those already voting. From this, the Commission

would like to argue that there is more time given to the voters in the event that they want to vote.

Lastly, the Commission would like to argue that the COMELEC Calendar was released

during the start of the first semester. Also, given that the petitioners are candidates, these candidates


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would have known what the election dates were and how many days the elections had. Was the

insufficiency of time not considered before the elections happened? Why is this only currently getting

brought up?

Option for Hard Ballots

The option for hard ballots given to each and every student should also be considered in

deciding whether or not there was enough time and whether or not this affects voters

disenfranchisement.

First, with regards to voting time, poll officers were instructed to let people vote using hard

ballots in the event that the line is too long. Also, hard ballots were an option to everyone. This being

said, only using computer time to determine if there was sufficient time is, again, an

oversimplification.

Second, Yu et al. argues that the option for hard ballot was not publicized and was not known

to all. First of all, the Commission would like to argue that there is insufficient data that proves that

most of the student body did not know about the option to use hard ballots. Moreover, the

Commission would like to argue that the option to use hard ballots was clearly shown through the

General Elections promos as seen below. The promo clearly shows a computer (option for voting

using the automated system) plus a hard ballot (option for voting using the manual system) equals the

General Elections 2014. Though one may argue that hard ballots are symbols for elections,

computers are not. Hence, in the promo, we are not merely showing symbols for elections but

showing the means in order for people to cast their votes (as also indicated by the plus and the equal

signs). Lastly, these voters have gone through at least one election (the Freshmen and Special

Elections) whether or not they voted, hence, these people would know more about the elections than

some people may assume.


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The Commission would also want to ask that decisions not be based on assumptions not

backed up by data. Despite the qualitative nature of these assumptions, there are still ways to ensure

that these are not merely assumptions (i.e. surveys, etc.)

Grounding the Theories in Reality

In every decision, it is important to not just look at theoretical computations but also reality.

Here, the Commission would like to discuss how the Commissions arguments are backed up by

reality.

(1) Insufficient Time. Was there actual evidence based on observations in the poll stations thatthere was insufficient time given to the voters? As mentioned earlier, the Commission goes by

the rule that all voters currently voting or lined up by 5:00 pm should be accommodated.

However, there was never a situation that asked for such extension. Although the Commission

is more than willing to give extensions every day in case such things happened, there was nota need for it.

(2) Disenfranchisement. Did people not vote because they were disenfranchised or because theydid not really want to vote? Did system errors really push people to be disenfranchised or

were they already disenfranchised in the first place? In the first place, there was already the

perceived apathy of students with regards to campus politics.

(3) Pushing for the Quota.As mentioned earlier, the fact that there were only three days allottedfor elections was already made public by the start of the semester. Aside from this, based on

the Commissions observations on the voter turnout in the first day of extended elections

(Thursday, February 20, 2014), the number of new voters are insignificant as compared to the


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remaining number of voters (100 people voted out of the remaining 5000, hence, only 2% of

the remaining voting population). If the extension was made based on insufficient time and to

make up for the lost votes due to disenfranchisement, then it does not seem like a very

effective solution. With the rate of the voters, assuming 100 voters also vote tomorrow, the

extension only made up for the quota and not really the reasons mentioned by the petitioners.

Based on the arguments posed above, the Commission would like to request for a

reconsideration of the decision made on the petition sent by Yu et al.

Signed by,

(Sgd) Denise Olondriz

COMELEC Chief Commissioner

(Sgd.) Joyce Donaire

COMELEC Human Resources Commissioner

(Sgd.) Mikee Razon

COMELEC Finance Commissioner

(Sgd.) Justine Guino

COMELEC Secretariat Commissioner

(Sgd.) James Ong

COMELEC Logistics Commissioner

Documents

Respondent_Motion for Reconsideration