SC junks Taguig mayor’s bid to stop vote recount

The Supreme Court has junked Taguig Mayor Maria Laarni Cayetano’s petition to stop the recount of the results of the mayoralty race in the city during the May 2010 polls. In a ruling dated April 15, 2011, the high court said it has no jurisdiction to review the Commission on Election’s (Comelec) Second Division’s order for a recount of the ballots in Taguig’s 217 clustered precincts. “The Court has no jurisdiction to review an order, whether final or interlocutory, even a final resolution of a division of the Comelec. Stated otherwise, the Court can only review via certiorari a decision, order, or ruling of the Comelec en banc," the decision read. Through the decision, the Comelec can now proceed in its recount of the results of Taguig City’s mayoralty race. The decision, penned by Justice Antonio Eduardo Nachura, likewise stated that the Comelec itself should resolve the case, and that Cayetano should “ventilate her grievances" before the poll body. Former SC Associate Justice Dante Tinga, who lost his mayoralty bid to Cayetano during the May 2010 polls, filed an election protest before the Comelec last year, demanding a recount. In August last year, the Comelec Second Division found Tinga’s plea sufficient in form and substance, and ordered Taguig City’s election office to turn over the ballots to the Comelec main office in Manila for the recount. Cayetano is the wife of Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano. – Andreo C. Calonzo/KBK, GMA News