VERA FILES FACT SHEET: Who among the 2022 hopefuls have spread misinformation?

Some 572 aspirants vying for national positions in the 2022 elections filed their certificates of candidacy (COC) from Oct. 1 to 8 at the Garden Tent, Hotel Sofitel in Pasay City.

VERA Files Fact Check tracked who among the aspirants for president (97), vice president (29), and senator (270) have flip-flopped or become sources of mis- and disinformation from April 2016, when it began its fact-checking initiative.

See how the aspirants fared here:

President

Vice President

Senator

What’s next?

Commission on Elections (Comelec) Law Department Director John Rex Laudiangco said in an Oct. 8 media briefing that the list of candidates will remain tentative until Nov. 15, the last day for substitution of candidates. Based on the Philippine Omnibus Election Code, the list could change if:

1. An aspirant withdraws, dies or is disqualified

After the last day of filing of COCs, any aspirant who withdraws, dies or gets disqualified can be substituted until Nov. 15 by a person certified from the same political party. Those who filed independently cannot be substituted.

A person can be disqualified if one has been declared insane or incompetent by a competent authority, or has been sentenced by final judgment for subversion, insurrection, rebellion, or any offense with a penalty of more than 18 months, or for a crime involving “moral turpitude.”

For cases concerning the above-mentioned court convictions, the Omnibus Election Code states that the aspirant is barred from running for any office, unless he or she was given plenary pardon or granted amnesty.

If an aspirant dies or is disqualified ー referred to as an “involuntary withdrawal” ー after Nov. 15, he or she can be substituted “all the way up to the midday of election day” by someone who has the same surname, according to Comelec spokesperson James Jimenez.

2. An aspirant is declared nuisance

Under Section 69 of the Omnibus Election Code, the Comelec may cancel a COC if it is shown that the certificate has been filed to “put the election process in mockery,” to cause confusion among the voters by the similarity of names of the registered candidates, or the person has “no bona fide intention” to run for office.

The names of nuisance aspirants will then be removed from the tentative list of candidates. If an aspirant goes to the Supreme Court and does not get a positive resolution, Laudiangco said he or she “will forever be struck out of that list” for the 2022 elections.

The commission has reminded aspirants that the deadline to correct typographical or clerical errors is on Nov. 8. The tentative list of candidates is expected to be made available by the end of the same month.

Editor’s note: This article has been updated to correct the wording on the grounds for the disqualification of a candidate: “A person can be disqualified if one has been declared insane or incompetent by a competent authority, or has been sentenced by final judgment for subversion, insurrection, rebellion, or any offense with a penalty of more than 18 months [or] for a crime involving ‘moral turpitude.'”