(Eagle News) — The Supreme Court has ordered the camps of Vice President Leni Robredo and former Senator Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. to pay more than P80 million for his poll protest to move forward.
The SC, sitting as the Presidential Electoral Tribunal (PET), said in a resolution dated March 21, that the P81.46 million is needed for the recovery of election documents and ballot boxes from precincts that are being contested.
The former senator, in particular, is asking for a recount of votes in 39,221 clustered precincts, or 132,446 precincts.
Robredo, on the other hand, is contesting the results in 8,042 clustered precincts, or 31,278 precincts.
All in all, the PET said Marcos will have to pay P66,023,000, and Robredo, P15,439,000 in two tranches.
The first payment will have to be received by the PET by April 14.
The second tranche should have been received by July 14.
Marcos’ camp is set to file an appeal, while Robredo’s camp will still study the resolution.
Marcos lost to Robredo by 263,473 votes in the May 2016 election.
The former senator filed the protest with the PET, saying there were irregularities in the polls.
These supposed irregularities included massive vote-buying, pre-shading of ballots, misreading of ballots, among others.
