CEBU CITY – Move on.
Cebu City Mayor-elect Nestor Archival gave this piece of advice to defeated mayoral candidate Michael Rama, who filed a protest to contest the results of the recent midterm elections.
ARCHIVAL
Archival shrugged off the election protest filed by Rama before the Commission on Elections (Comelec), saying that the irregularities cited by the former mayor were “pure imagination.”
“Basically, it’s all imagination actually. It’s just an imagination by Mike,” Archival told reporters on Friday, May 23.
Archival won the mayoral race with 256,197 votes with incumbent Mayor Raymond Alvin Garcia placing second and Rama ranking third.
Rama alleged that the automated counting machines (ACMs) used during the May 12 elections were defective.
“There were a lot of complaints that the machines were defective. We need to open the machines and look at the real results,” Rama said in a recent press conference.
“If the numbers don’t add up, if the trends defy reason, we must scrutinize,” Rama added.
Archival questioned the move of Rama of singling out the ACMs used here.
Instead of contesting the results, Rama should just move on and run again in the next election.
“My appeal to the mayor (Rama), just fight in the next election so this will stop,” said Archival, who assured that the election protest will not affect his assumption of office.
Garcia said he was not surprised by Rama’s actions, saying that the former mayor has not conceded defeat.
While he has yet to receive a copy of the protest, Garcia acknowledged Rama’s decision to resort to legal remedies.
“He’s entitled to the remedies allowed by law. If there were really any irregularities involved in the elections, then your remedy is an election protest. But we all know that it will take forever…Let’s just focus on improving and building Cebu City rather than wasting our effort and time on the election protest,” Garcia said.