INQUIRER.net Eleksyon 2007

Comelec finds complaint vs Bedol

Philippine Daily Inquirer

MANILA, Philippines--The Commission on Elections (Comelec) will pursue a criminal complaint against ex-Maguindanao election supervisor Lintang Bedol, who disappeared after being implicated in an election fraud case last year.

The Comelec's law department chief Ferdinand Rafanan made the announcement Saturday after department employees found an unsigned draft of a subpoena and criminal complaint against Bedol during a recent inventory of office files.

The draft complaint listed the set of election documents that were lost while stored in Bedol's office in the Maguindanao capitol after the May 2007 midterm elections.

Election watchdogs feared the documents were used to manipulate the votes in the senatorial race.

The document found by the employees on Friday was believed to have been prepared by Alioden Dalaig, the former law department head who was shot to death in November 2007.

Rafanan said the department will pursue the criminal case, even though Bedol has been missing for months. "There might be a case before July 15," he said.

The Comelec has not filed a criminal complaint against Bedol even after disclosures of his role in alleged election fraud in the province.

The Comelec did not even issue a subpoena requiring the election officer to produce the lost documents, Rafanan said.

The poll body was only able to indict Bedol for indirect contempt for his refusal to attend the Comelec investigation of the Maguindanao scandal last August.

The lost documents case was a bigger, more important case than the contempt charge, which was only "incidental," Rafanan said.

Bedol, he said, could be held liable for failing to attend the Maguindanao canvassing and for failing to account for the ballots, ballot boxes and election paraphernalia he received and placed in his safekeeping.

It was unclear why Dalaig failed to file the complaint against Bedol, Rafanan said. "Maybe if he was not killed, he would have filed it," he said.

Dalaig was gunned down by a hired assassin police later identified to be PO1 Juan Basser Ampatuan in November 2007.

Kristine L. Alave

Copyright 2009 INQUIRER.net and content partners. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.