Veteran Davao City Councilor Danilo C. Dayanghirang has asked the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG), the Philippine National Police (PNP) and other concerned agencies to investigate vote-buying and other chaotic incidents that led to the cancellation of the scheduled election of officers of the 17,600-strong Philippine Councilors League (PCL) last February 27 during the 11th PCL National Congress in Manila.
Dayanghirang, who has been city councilor for more than 20 years, is the incumbent PCL chairman. However, he said he officially inhibited himself from the activities in the preparation of the convention and election because he is a candidate for chairman again.
“I did it (inhibiting himself from the convention preparations) to set a good example and in fairness to the rival group ( headed by Councilor Jesciel Richard Salceda of Pulangi, Albay, opposing candidate for PCL chairman),” Dr. Dayanghirang said.
Monitoring the PCL events from a nearby hotel, the Davao City lawmaker said the problem started when “surprisingly, a few hours before voting time, (a number of people from) the other camp dictated (and) inserted new features in the computer (voting system).”
“Allegedly, when you vote for Tata Sala, the name of the opponent will come out, voting for Salceda. Dayanghirang’s name props up so with other positions in the ballots. But what is always highlighted in the social media is my name only, excluding the other candidates in question which were also affected in the trial test,” Dayanghirang said in a written statement he distributed when he guested at the Kapehan sa Dabaw Monday morning
He said that “all the mismatch of names resulted only after they introduced the new features.”
The Davao City councilor said that the chaos also compromised the security of the voting site as many unidentified persons entered the restricted area.
For instance, the IT (information technology) guy of the other camp had gained access to the computer site, dictating the features to the official programmer hired by PCL who even cried due to pressures on her.
“Their plan to interfere resulted to the distraction of the voting system,” he told reporters attending Kapehan, attending that some non-PCL members had entered the voting place.
At around 3:30 p.m., the computer glitch was fixed and it was now the consensus that the voting will continue.
However, the other camp allegedly opposed the continued use of the fixed computer system and now demanded that the voting be done manually instead. Dayanghirang said the idea of manual voting was rejected because it was humanly impossible. Many of the councilors already left the area, there was no time to prepare the ballots on top of other reasons. By this time, many unidentified persons have already swamped the area, alarming many PCL members who smelled trouble and chose to leave the place.
The crowd milling around the place became rowdy during the night event and some of them heckled the group of Councilor Jhong Hilario and threw plastic bottles at the entertainers.
When informed of the situation, Dayanghirang said he called PNP Chief Archie Gamboa to request assistance. He said a group of police officers came led by at least two police generals.
To save the situation and restore order, he said the PCL board (with Dayanghirang presiding) met to decide to suspend the election and reset the voting on some other time. The board also decided to have the chaos investigated with the culprit or culprits charged properly and penalized, if warranted.
Dayanghirang asked DILG and other concerned agencies to investigate alleged vote-buying. He questioned the fact a law firm in Bicol was allowed to pay P7.3 million in check to PCL for the registration of 583 member councilors from Bicol.
He said the act was not necessary and constituted vote-buying, arguing that DILG has authorized attending councilors to get P15,000 each from their respective local government units to cover registration fee and other authorized expenses.
He also wants DILG and the election committee to investigate why the rival camp was allowed to change some features of the computerized voting system, resulting to the glitch, when the DILG earlier certified that the system was working well after tests made before the PCL national event.
He also said that the suggestion of former PCL president Luis “Chavit” Singson, now president of the mayors league, for the PCL board to resign because of the February 27 fracas, cannot be done because a process has to be followed. He said he prefers that the DILG, PNP and other government bodies be allowed to investigate and come up with a report before the PCL board will take any action.
Dayanghirang said if the February 27 balloting pushed through as scheduled, he could have won the election as shown by results of surveys.
During his Kapehan sa Dabaw appearance, last Monday morning, the city lawmaker showed photos and video recordings of the PCL incidents, including the P7.3-million check paid for the registration of more than 500 PCL members from Bicol and wads of money allegedly used in the vote-buying operation. He also showed the unruly crowd which disrupted the presentation of the entertainers brought by Councilor Hilario, a popular dancer and movie and tv actor himself.
