Despite the favorable decision of the Regional Trial Court on the election protest that gave Princess Vanessa Rodriguez a one-vote victory, the legal battle over who really won the May 12, 2025 mayoral election is not over.
Last Monday, according to the camp of Mayor Juan T. Rodulfo, his counsel has filed a petition for certiorari with the Commission on Elections pursuant to Section 4, Rule 65 of the Rules of Court, as amended by Administrative Matter No. 97-7-12-SC.
Said rule states that in election cases involving an act or an omission of a municipal or a regional trial court, the petition shall be filed exclusively with the Commission on Elections.
Rodulfo likely believes that the RTC acted with grave abuse of discretion in the election, particularly with regard to the decision of then RTC Acting Presiding Judge Ritche Regala to allow the inclusion of three rejected ballots found contained in a sealed envelope but outside the ballot box for the precinct.
His camp would be challenging RTC Judge Irwin Peña’s impartiality in the light of Atty. Oliver T. Rodulfo’s allegations during his Catanduanes Tonto blog where he disclosed that Peña is a member of the Partido Federal ng Pilipinas (PFP).
The lawyer said that the then prosecutor was accompanied during his swearing-in in 2022 by then PFP Catanduanes provincial chairman Eulogio R. Rodriguez, the father of the election protest winner.
Unfortunately for Atty. Rodulfo, a photo of the two men during the oathtaking has yet to surface and, worse, two local politicians who also became party members at the same time have begged off from executing sworn affidavits attesting to the presence of Peña and Rodriguez during the event.
As of Tuesday morning, while this paper was being printed, the Court has yet to issue a decision on Princess Vanessa Rodriguez’s motion for execution pending appeal that would allow her to assume the post of Bato mayor.
It is not known whether the Court, like the Aug. 7, 2026 promulgation of the election protest decision, would again invite officials of the Commission on Elections (COMELEC) and the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG).
According to the Rodulfo camp, they suspected the decision would go against them when the judge moved the schedule of the promulgation three places down the list to await the presence of the COMELEC and DILG officials, something that they say never happened in past election protest promulgations.
Based on a previous Supreme Court ruling, the Court may order the execution of the decision in an election contest before the expiration of the period to appeal.
But there must be good reasons for granting the motion and such reasons must “constitute superior circumstances demanding urgency that will outweigh the injury or damage should the losing party secure a reversal of the judgment on appeal…”
The order must also manifest that “the defeat of the protestee or the victory of the protestant has been clearly established.”
Said reasons would be examined by COMELEC, along with the circumstances in which the Court ruled on Rodriguez’s July 4, 2025 urgent motion seeking the turnover and inclusion of three (3) ballots that were rejected by the Vote Counting Machines from Clustered Precinct No. 10 in Binanuahan and omitted from the delivered ballot box.
Then Judge Regala ruled in favor of the inclusion of the three rejected ballots, reasoning that voters should not be disenfranchised for an omission they did not commit.
Incidentally, after this ruling, Protestant Rodulfo filed a petition for Certiorari before COMELEC, imputing grave abuse of discretion to Judge Regala in denying his prayer for summary dismissal of the protest and refusing to inhibit himself from the proceedings.
That petition was dismissed by the COMELEC First Division in a resolution promulgated on Feb. 11, 2026, with the judge found to have properly exercised his discretion in determining the true will of the people.
That decision on the first petition for certiorari would likely play a significant part in how COMELEC would consider the new petition.
The Bato poll controversy reminds those who had voted in the local elections of 1988, 1992 and 1995 of how the mayoral post in Virac between the late Rodulfo “Ribong” Sarmiento and Jose “Cito” Alberto II was decided by only a few votes.
Whoever said that today’s elections have become boring enough to stay away from polling places should once more engage themselves in the democratic process, if this nation has to have leaders truly deserving of the people’s trust.