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THE PRESIDENT
The Unmaking of the President
by Sheila S. Coronel
Mrs. Arroyo is reaping the consequences of the damage she has wrought on key institutions.

The Tangled Tale of the Tapes
There appears to be more comedy than cunning in the release of the "Garci" tapes.

Bye, Bye Love
Gloria and Mike complement, but also compete with, each other.

THE OPPOSITION
Despite Susan, The Opposition is not Quite Smelling Like Roses
by Luz Rimban
Mrs. Poe is the best thing that has ever happened to a splintered and discredited opposition.

Pondering Plans B to G
A whole range of options is being offered as a way out of the current mess.

THE ELECTION
Who Really Won in 2004?
by Yvonne T. Chua
The experts say the fight was so close it was a statistical dead heat.

WHAT WENT WRONG IN THE COMELEC?
The Comelec's Fall from Grace
by Alecks P. Pabico
The questionable credentials and integrity of commissioners have wrecked the election body.

Sins of the Commission
Scandals have hounded the Comelec for years.

VIRGILIO GARCILLANO
Master Operator
by Sheila S. Coronel
The man whose voice is heard on The Tapes is an expert in election fraud.

MINDANAO
Working 'Miracles' in Mindanao
by Yvonne T. Chua
The "Garci" recording gives clues on how the cheating was done in the South.

Statistically Improbable
The result of the elections in some Mindanao towns challenges credulity.

PARTY LIST
Messing with the Party List
by Luz Rimban
Favored party-list groups got more than a little help from the Comelec fraud squad.

THE FIRST FAMILY
Shame and Scandal in the Family
The Arroyos have weathered allegations that range from keeping secret bank accounts to getting money from illegal gambling.

TECHNOLOGY
Blogging Gloria
by Alecks P. Pabico
Ringtones, bootlegged CDs, and blogs are the new weapons of resistance.

POINTS OF VIEW
Writings on the (Democracy) Wall
Filipinos have never been shy about speaking out, especially in turbulent times.

HELLO, GARCI?
The Non(Musical): A Program Guide
There really is only one Garci recording, but several versions of it have been released. A full transcript and a list of the cast of characters in The Tapes is in this issue.

The questionable credentials and integrity of comissioners have wrecked the election body.

by ALECKS P. PABICO

	Philippine elections have yet to graduate from the manual counting system — a throwback from the first-ever held local polls more than a century ago. [photos courtesy of Malaya]

TO DESTROY an institution like the Commission on Elections (Comelec), you must first fill it up with handpicked commissioners with questionable credentials and even more dubious impartiality. Then, let them run the constitutional body as if they were ruling over personal fiefdoms. This would then reduce middle-level bureaucrats to mere vassals doing — or forced to do — their every bidding, including perhaps, as the taped conversations involving President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and Comelec Commissioner Virgilio Garcillano suggest, rigging the elections in their political benefactor's favor.

Such is the sorry state today of the constitutionally ordained guardian of the ballot that the pendulum of public opinion concerning its existence swings between two extreme calls: the mass resignation of its commissioners and its total abolition. Comelec's credibility, which enjoyed highs in the post-Marcos era during the days of Hilario Davide Jr. (now Supreme Court chief justice), Haydee Yorac (former Presidential Commission on Good Government chairperson) and Christian Monsod, has sunk so low, eroded through the years by the unending scandals involving corruption, incompetence, and partisanship.

These days, what was supposed to be an impartial body reeks of the politics of accommodation, one that has allowed politicians to stack it with officials and staff that they have endorsed. "The estimate by directors I've talked to is that as much as 93 percent of the entire rank and file are endorsed politically by various local officials and politicians," says Ramon Casiple, executive director of the Institute for Political and Electoral Reform (IPER).

Who is to blame for Comelec's fall from grace? A visibly appalled Monsod is rather straightforward: "I think it starts from the top. They have appointed the wrong leaders. They appointed commissioners that serve their own agenda. I blame the appointing power and Congress."

Under the Constitution, the president is vested with the authority to appoint the Comelec's seven commissioners who each have a seven-year term. Congress, through the bicameral Commission on Appointments (CA), confirms their appointments.

In Monsod's view, among the presidents who succeeded Marcos, it was only Corazon Aquino who was concerned about institution-building of the commission. Subsequent presidents — Fidel Ramos, Joseph Estrada and the incumbent Arroyo — have all contributed to the weakening of the Comelec, he says, by politicizing the appointments of its commissioners.

HIRING POLITICIANS' RECOMMENDEES
Ramos was responsible for putting Bernardo Pardo to the chairmanship that Monsod had vacated in early 1995, even though Pardo himself admitted that he had no background in election law. The former general turned president also appointed two commissioners — Manolo Gorospe and Graduacion R. Claravall (now deceased) — who were bypassed by the CA seven times but whom he kept on appointing until they finally got confirmed.

It was the Pardo Comelec that started the practice of hiring applicants endorsed by politicians to the poll body. In a 1997 article in i magazine, a middle-level Comelec official recalled how Pardo had asked the screening committee to get endorsements from the city mayor in hiring election officers. A discussion among commissioners that the official witnessed revealed that one of them had already promised the position to someone endorsed by a congressman.

Pardo himself was less than conscious about being seen with politicians. On two occasions, he was among Ramos's traveling companions in the then president's visits to Mindanao, even allowing himself to be photographed beside the chief executive, flashing Ramos's signature thumbs-up sign.

Monsod also recalls that during the 1998 elections, Pardo went to Estrada and gave him the Comelec count. "In effect, he told Estrada that he had been elected president," relates Monsod. "First, it's not the Comelec that counts the presidential tally, it's Congress. Second, a Comelec chair should not go to a candidate and present the Comelec unofficial count and say you've been elected president."

As for Gorospe, his stint as commissioner is remembered more for his media antics. At one time, he earned the title "Kissing Lolo" for making unwelcome passes at fellow commissioner Remedios Salazar-Fernando, now appellate court justice, and Comelec secretaries. He was also involved in a tussle with Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago, an incident that elicited a remark from the Comelec commissioner about the senator being mad at him only because she was jealous of his shapely legs. "In full view of the TV cameras, he raised his pale (but hairless) leg up for everyone to see," recalls ABS-CBN reporter Gigi Grande, who covered the Comelec for six years until 2003. By the 2004 elections, Gorospe had morphed into one of Arroyo's election lawyers.

Many had looked forward to a quieter Comelec when Alfredo Benipayo became its head in 2001. But the former Supreme Court administrator was soon ruing the day he stepped into the Comelec because of the so-called 'Gang of Four' that was made up of Estrada appointees Luzviminda Tancangco, Ralph Lantion, Rufino Javier, and Mehol Sadain. Together, they made life as Comelec chief unbearable for Benipayo, now the solicitor general.

Among the major sources of the much publicized petty politics and bitter squabbling in the Comelec was the Gang's intransigence on projects of the modernization committee headed by Tancangco. This included the Voter Registration and Identification System (VRIS), a P6.5-billion project to computerize voter registration and the voters' lists awarded to a consortium led by the Photokina Marketing Corp. during the time of President Estrada. The Supreme Court later voided the contract, 14-0, primarily because it was "illegal and against public policy" as the project cost was way beyond the amount appropriated by Congress. Only P1 billion had been allotted for the VRIS project in the 2000 national budget. (See sidebar for other Comelec scams and scandals)

For the Photokina fiasco and other alleged corrupt and unconstitutional acts, Tancancgo faced an impeachment complaint filed by more than 200 local and international civil society organizations under the People v. Tancancgo Movement. But the House committee on justice denied the conduct of a formal investigation in October 2003 for insufficiency of substance. This despite a 280-page complaint supported by official Comelec and Commission on Audit documents.

UNPRECEDENTED IN COMELEC HISTORY
Benipayo is the immediate predecessor of current Comelec chairman Benjamin Abalos Sr., who was appointed in June 2002. Abalos's appointment is unprecedented in the commission's history, because he is a politician and a known Lakas party stalwart. A former chief of the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority and three-term Mandaluyong city mayor, Abalos has acknowledged his close friendship with First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo, as well as siblings of the president. His personal ties with the Chua family, owners of Photokina, are also known.

	Perennial election scene. Confused voters scramble to check the registration lists for their missing names and designated voting precincts.

Arroyo's other controversial appointees included Commissioners Virgilio Garcillano and Manuel Barcelona Jr. The two were considered only ad interim appointments because Congress was no longer in session when Arroyo named them in February 2004 to replace the retired Tancangco and Lantion. They were bypassed by Congress in June 2004 but were reinstated by Arroyo until their appointments lapsed in June this year.

A Marcos-era election official, Garcillano retired as Region 10 director in 2002 before being resurrected as Comelec commissioner. He has been accused of masterminding dagdag-bawas operations in Mindanao. By the 2004 elections, Garcillano was commissioner for Region 4 (Southern Tagalog).

Barcelona, meanwhile, was put in charge of several Mindanao regions including the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM). According to Sen. Aquilino Pimentel Jr., Barcelona was "a partisan member of the Gloria Bantay Bayan," a pro-Arroyo organization that contributed funding to the president's campaign. But it was apparently the more Mindanao-elections-savvy Garcillano that Arroyo relied upon and called up to "protect" her votes down south.