CEBU CITY – Petitions that sought to nullify 278 voters in Mandaue City have been junked.

In a Feb.  10 decision, Municipal Trial Court in Cities Judge Francis Ian Birondo junked all the 28 petitions filed by an ally of dismissed Mayor Jonas Cortes.

Former Barangay Subangdaku Captain Ernie Manatad, a candidate for city councilor Under Team Mandaue, filed 28 separate petitions to exclude 278 new voters in Mandaue from the list of the Commission on Elections (Comelec).

He cited that they sent out “verifiers” to look for the residences of the respondents whose names are in the Comelec Mandaue voters’ list, even asking help from purok leaders. 

Manatad called the transferee voters as “fictitious and flying voters…, through clever machinations such as deliberate concealment of their actual residence, misdeclaration, and misrepresentation.”

The court was not convinced.

Birondo cited that the presence of respondents during the hearing made the claim of Manatad that the residences of new voters could not be found. 

There are around 5,000 new voters in Mandaue and the respondents they picked are 278 names in five barangays. 

During the hearing, Anna Fleur Gujilde, Mandaue Election Officer IV, said that they asked for valid IDs during the registration. The respondents who joined the hearing were able to provide information regarding their length of stay at their barangays, their previous residences, and places of previous registration as voters, and the reasons they transferred registration in Mandaue.

Birondo, in his ruling, cited the qualification to be a voter, as outlined in the Constitution which states: “All citizens of the Philippines not otherwise disqualified by law, who are at least 18 years of age, and who shall have resided in the Philippines for at least one year, and in the place wherein they propose to vote for at least six months immediately preceding the election.” 

For emphasis, the judge highlighted the phrase “at least six months immediately preceding the election.”

Birondo also cited Manatad’s assertion that his petition was posted in the bulletin boards of Mandaue City Hall, the concerned barangays, and in the barangay gyms. 

“The same method was done by the Court in the service of the notices of hearing… Yet, these private respondents were able to attend the hearing…This would then discredit petitioner’s claims that these private respondents were unknown in their respective barangays and diligent efforts were exerted to ascertain their identities and residences,” he said.

“Clearly, the petitioner failed to convince the court that private respondents should be excluded as voters of their respective barangays in Mandaue.”