Commission on Elections (Comelec) Chairperson George Erwin Garcia is preparing to file criminal charges against individuals behind the “spurious” documents allegedly listing his name in several overseas bank accounts.
Garcia said he plans to file a case against those spreading information about the spurious accounts, for falsification of public and private documents.
He said that under the law, those who hold falsified documents are presumed to be its author, meaning the poll body chair must prove that he is not the one who falsified the document.
“We will prove that those accounts do not exist and do not belong to me. I don’t have such accounts. Therefore all of those are falsified,” Garcia said.
He allegedly received bribes from a South Korean firm lor awarding the P17.99-billion vote counting machine contract for the 2025 national and local elections.
It was Rep. Rodante Marcoleta of party-list Sagip who first claimed that at least P1 billion worth of funds were transferred from South Korean-based banks to 49 offshore accounts supposedly linked to an unnamed Comelec official.
Meanwhile, the Comelec employees union expressed their full support for the Comelec chairman and the agency, claiming the allegations were part of a propaganda to destroy the poll body’s integrity.
“The systematic attack on the credibility of the institution ahead of the May 2025 elections is a well-oiled demolition job that is clearly meant to erode the public’s trust in the automated election system,” the Comelec-EU said.
“As election frontliners, we cannot stand idly by as our beloved institution and our leaders are maligned with allegations and insinuations that are so blatantly unfounded and absurd,” it added.
The group said the attacks on Garcia and the Comelec leadership is “an attack on the institution and a direct affront to the credibility of the elections that we have worked so hard to uphold and preserve.”
