ILOILO CITY – The Commission on Elections (Comelec) has disqualified reelectionist Mayor John Lloyd Pacete of Bugasong town, Antique province from the May 2025 elections.
PACETE (FB)
In a 15-page ruling, the Comelec First Division cancelled Pacete’s Certificate of Candidacy for serving as mayor for nine consecutive years.
Comelec ruled in favor of the petition filed by Antique Provincial Board Member Victor Condez who is running for mayor of Bugasong.
Condez said Pacete misrepresented when he filed his COC last October.
The Comelec noted that Pacete has been elected mayor for three consecutive terms – 2016, 2019, and 2022.
Pacete in response said his term was interrupted in 2019 when he was convicted by a local court for violating the gun ban in the May 2016 elections.
His conviction stemmed from an April 2016 incident when he was the vice mayor and a mayoral candidate. He illegally took a gun allegedly used by a barangay chairman in a fatal scuffle.
Pacete won in the May 2019 elections amid the conviction. He acquitted by the Court of Appeals and was released.