The Commission on Elections was required by the Supreme Court to submit a list of the partylist groups whose nominees were allowed to withdraw.
Chairman George Garcia of the Comelec was told by Chief Justice Alexander Gesmundo to submit to Solicitor General the complete list of partylist who allowed their nominee to withdraw all at the same time.
This was during the oral arguments resumption last Tuesday afternoon on the petition challenging the substitution of former Comelec commissioner Ma. Rowena Guanzon.
The Duterte youth filed the petition to the high bench questioning Guanzon’s substitution as the P3PWD Partylist nominee.
For his part, SC Associate Justice Jhosep Lopez asked Assistant Solicitor General Maria Victoria Sardillo, “In this case, the proclamation was done by the Comelec and that proclamation was the subject of the petition before the Comelec. The resolution issued by the Comelec, allowing the withdrawals of the other nominees and accepting the nomination of petitioner Guanzon.”
But Sardillo cleared that the proclamation is not the issue but rather the withdrawal and substitution.
The withdrawals were due to personal reasons and there were “no further elaborations on what those personal reasons are,” Sardillo said.