LINGAYEN– Gov. Amado Espino Jr. is confident that the election protest filed by his opponent, outgoing 2nd District Representative Victor Agbayani, will not succeed in the face of his landslide victory by more than half a million votes.

Espino has yet to receive a copy of the election protest but said he is aware of it.

A copy of the 71-page election protest was obtained by The PUNCH from the Provincial Election Office in Dagupan City on June 24.

“I will respond as soon as I receive a copy,” said Espino in an interview after coming out from a conference with officials of the National Power Corporation (NPC) and the San Roque Power Corporation at the Capitol Resort Hotel last week.

Espino did say that he could not comprehend how the election protest could have a chance of succeeding as the final canvass showed he garnered 833,441 votes against Agbayani’s 301,049 votes, a margin of 532,329 votes.

Agbayani, represented by the Bello Law Office, filed the election protest 10 days after Espino and his teammate Vice-Governor-elect Jose Ferdinand Calimlim were proclaimed by the Provincial Board of Canvassers, which is within the reglamentary period prescribed by law.

In his protest, Agbayani has questioned the results of the elections in 47 municipalities and cities due to what he called an “assortment of electoral frauds and irregularities that illicitly benefitted Protestee Espino”.

These municipalities/cities, together with 2,135 clustered precincts being contested and the corresponding votes obtained by the parties, were reflected in the Statement of Votes By Precinct submitted by Agbayani to the Comelec.

Among the grounds cited by Agbayani is the “abnormally high” percentage of voters who actually voted.

Agbayani asserts that the voter’s list was padded with double registrants and non-qualified voters in the contested precincts of the municipalities/cities.–LM

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