In dismissing the petition for disqualification for insufficiency of
evidence and lack of merit, the COMELEC First Division admonished
petitioner and his counsel for attempting to mislead the COMELEC by
making false and untruthful statements[8] in his petition. On
reconsideration, the COMELEC, En Banc, affirmed the findings and
conclusions of its First Division.
Before us, petitioner assails the Resolutions of public respondent
COMELEC for being violative of his right to due process, and thus,
issued with grave abuse of discretion. It is petitioners argument that
the dismissal of his petition for disqualification on the ground of
insufficiency of evidence was unfounded, considering that no hearing
on the merits was conducted by public respondent on the matter.
Petitioner next contends that grave abuse of discretion was
likewise attendant in public respondents act of dismissing the petition
for disqualification for insufficiency of evidence, despite the
overwhelming pieces of evidence of petitioner, consisting of the video
cassette, pictures and affidavits, which were not denied by private
respondent.[9] Petitioner further decries the fact that private respondent
presented no evidence to substantiate his defense, while all the
pieces of evidence that he submitted in his petition for disqualification
were strong enough to prove violation by private respondent of
Section 68 of the Omnibus Election Code.[10]
Before touching on the merits, we shall first resolve the procedural
matters raised by private respondent; namely, forum-shopping and
failure to file this petition on time.
It is not disputed that, in addition to the petition for disqualification,
petitioner also filed a criminal complaint [11] and an election protest ex
abundante cautelam[12] with public respondent COMELEC.Private
respondent contends that, inasmuch as the petition for disqualification
and the complaint for election offense involve the same issues and
charges, i.e., vote-buying, exerting undue influence on BEI members,
petitioner should be held liable for forum-shopping.