Cruz's Column

As I See It : Open poll returns to find out who cheated whom

Neal H. Cruz
Inquirer News Service

BELIEVE it or not, amid growing demands by the people for President Macapagal-Arroyo to resign for cheating in the last elections, she has now turned the tables on her accusers by saying that it is she who might have been cheated, citing exit polls that indicated a bigger winning margin for her over Fernando Poe, Jr. (FPJ).

There is one quick way to find out: open the election returns. That will end, definitely and conclusively, the questions about the legitimacy of her presidency, a problem that has plunged the nation into the present crisis.

This is very easy to do. The Presidential Electoral Tribunal will be opening the election returns for vice president because of the poll protest of opposition candidate Loren Legarda against Vice President Noli de Castro. Written on the same documents are the votes for the presidential candidates; it will take no more than a few seconds to tally their votes, too. As PET determines who won in the VP race, it will also know who won in the presidential race between Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo (GMA) and FPJ.

If it is GMA, then all the rallies and attacks against her will cease and she can finish her term peacefully until 2010. If it is FPJ, then whoever is the rightful vice president will have to take over. Either way, no more impeachment, no more people power, no more juntas, no more Truth Commission, no more pressures from ambitious politicians, no more diversionary tactics, no more lies and evasive answers, no more need to charm the press, no more stress-filled days and sleepless nights.

GMA can then retire in peace with Mike and their children and enjoy the company of her grandchildren. Little children grow very quickly, and if you are too busy, you will soon find out that they have grown into, ugh, adults and you have missed the best times of their growing-up. If I were GMA, I would choose my family over Malacañang. The presidency is a thankless job. Try as you might, you can't please everybody. As far as I'm concerned, they can have it.

The other choice is pure and simple torture. There won't be a moment's peace for her. The rallies will continue and even get bigger. Her popularity rating will continue to plunge until even those who voted for her will demand that she step down. The mental anguish will be so great that she could have a nervous breakdown. Even her allies will get tired and quit. Those who are hanging on because of the pay will decide that it is not worth it and leave. Others will hang on for selfish motives. Eventually the military and police will get tired, too, trying to protect her and decide she is not worth protecting, and they will side with the people. It is doubtful if she would be able to finish her term. It took three years from the assassination of Ninoy Aquino until Marcos was chased out of Malacañang. Joseph Estrada lasted only six months. Time is running out on GMA.

The advice of the Americans to Marcos to "cut and cut cleanly" also applies to GMA. There is no loss of honor in knowing when you are licked and in deciding to quit.

There is a clamor that if GMA is to be replaced, it should be done the "constitutional" way. Re-counting the votes to determine who really won is the most constitutional way.

Fr. Joaquin Bernas, the constitutional expert who was one of those who drafted the present Constitution, agrees that the PET can reopen the election returns for the presidential candidates. Although the Supreme Court has denied the petition of Susan Roces to continue the poll protest of her dead husband, FPJ, "for the purpose of finding the truth," Father Bernas said that "under the present circumstances, where there is a clamor for an impartial body to look into the Gloriagate scandal, the Supreme Court may yet be persuaded to reopen the FPJ protest, as an act of judicial statesmanship, if only to find out whether indeed Gloria garnered more votes than FPJ, or whether the Vice President should be president instead. That question, after all, is what is tearing the nation apart."

And the Supreme Court itself, in deciding election protests where one of the parties died, ruled that an election protest "is imbued with public interest and is not extinguished when one of the parties dies."

In De Castro vs. Comelec, decided in 1997, the Court said: "The death of the protestant, as in this case, neither constitutes a ground for the dismissal of the contest nor ousts the trial court of its jurisdiction to decide the election contest... Determination of what candidate has in fact been elected is a matter clothed with public interest, wherefore, public policy demands that an election contest, duly commenced, be not abated by the death of the contestant."

In Vda. De Mesa vs. Mencias, the tribunal ruled:

"x x x It is axiomatic that an election contest, involving as it does not only the adjudication and settlement of the private interests of the rival candidates but also the paramount need of dispelling once and for all the uncertainty that beclouds the real choice of the electorate with respect to who shall discharge the prerogatives of the offices within their gift, is a proceeding imbued with public interest which raises it into a plane over and above ordinary civil actions. For this reason, broad perspectives of public policy impose upon courts the imperative duty to ascertain, by all means within their command, who is the real candidate elected, in as expeditious a manner as possible, without being fettered by technicalities and procedural barriers to the end that the will of the people may not be frustrated."

Isn't the present grave national crisis, which is ripping the nation apart, worth the PET's "judicial statesmanship," to allow for the tallying of the returns for GMA and FPJ at the same time that it tallies the returns for Noli and Loren?