The Commission on Elections (Comelec) en banc does not decide on requests for inhibition as such requests may only be resolved by the person whose inhibition is being asked from.
This was the statement of Comelec spokesman James Jimenez on Wednesday, Feb. 16 when asked about the inhibition of Comelec Commissioner Aimee Ferolino being requested by Akbayan Partylist in its appeal.
This was after the First Division dismissed all three disqualification cases against presidential candidate Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr.
"Ultimately, I think we should allow the person involved to make the decision," Jimenez said.
"Inhibition is not a novel thing. Many cases, commissioners have inhibited if they feel that they would be able to be fair in the resolution of the case involved. So let's wait and see what the people involved will decide," he added.
Akbayan appealed to the "sense of decency" and "integrity" of Ferolino to inhibit herself from further participation in the said case.
Jimenez said that the en banc has already guaranteed many times its continued impartiality in all cases before.
Given that Comelec currently has only four members and if one of them inhibits, Jimenez said that the appeal will not be resolved immediately as they will have to wait for a quorum.
"Ultimately, I don't think it's the main consideration. I think ultimately, we will have to rely on the person being asked to inhibit, for their judgement on whether or not they will be able to handle the case objectively," Jimenez said.