A SHADOW QUICK COUNT
Like the other Cabinet members gathering certificates of canvass, Deles brought the documents she had collected to presidential legal counsel Cruz, who ran the K-4’s official quick-count center at Olympia Towers. But that was not the only Arroyo quick-count in town. K-4 campaign handlers now speak of another done with the help of the Philippine National Police (PNP), then under Gen. Hermogenes Ebdane. Now public works secretary, Ebdane’s name was mentioned in the “Hello, Garci” tapes.

The PNP appeared to have instructed some of its members to get copies of precinct-level election returns. These were forwarded to the K-4 headquarters for senatorial candidates and their handlers to monitor. On the count’s third day, however, the Senate tally was canceled, forcing the candidates to get their own precinct count.

A consultant of a K-4 senatorial candidate was told the PNP received word to send the results straight to Malacañang. The consultant was then asked to call two phone numbers to check the count’s progress: one number was a phone at the Olympia Towers; the other was picked up by someone at the Department of National Defense or DND.

Soliman recalls that as election day neared, then Defense Secretary Ermita increasingly took the lead among the Cabinet members in the president’s campaign. But Deles says Arroyo had stressed the need for Ermita, a Lakas regional chairman known for his good political instincts, to stay “behind the scene.” Neither Deles nor Soliman, though, remembers any instructions given to the DND.

The K-4 candidate’s consultant, however, says ex-elections commissioner Gorospe, who reportedly had his own group besides being in the K-4 legal team, was often at the DND during the counting. A former DND staffmember also says access to the Defense Intelligence Service Group (DISG) compound at the back of the DND building in Camp Aguinaldo was prohibited during the elections. The DISG primarily provides the security escort of the defense secretary and pursues intelligence projects.

Heavily tinted vehicles were seen coming in and out of the DISG, even at late nights and early hours in the morning, according to the ex-DND insider. New computers were moved there, along with Arroyo election paraphernalia. Ermita’s head executive assistant Alfredo Bunye, the presidential spokesman’s brother, was said to have held office at the DISG during this period as well.

Requests from local goverment officials for election materials were directed to the DISG. On occasion, DND soldiers and personnel were used to distribute the materials to requesting parties, says the former DND staff member.

FACT-FINDING BODIES AND ANTIDOTES
After the “Hello, Garci” tapes revealed what appears to be military involvement in manipulating last year’s elections, the military formed a fact-finding board to investigate four senior officers mentioned in the conversations: Lt. Gen. Hermogenes Esperon of the Special Operations Command; Maj. Gen. Gabriel Habacon of the 1st Infantry Division; Brig. Gen. Francisco Gudani, assistant superintendent of the Philippine Military Academy; and retired lieutenant general Roy Kyamko.

During the 2004 polls, Kyamko was Southern Command chief. Esperon was the deputy chief of Task Force HOPE, Gudani the former chief of Task Force Ranao, and Habacon chief of Task Force Comet.

In a statement last August 4, a group calling itself “The Young Officers Union of the new generation (YOUng)” sought the investigation of other officers for their supposed part in the alleged electoral fraud: Brig. Gen. Nehemias Pajarito, chief of the Army’s 104th Brigade based in Marawi City; Brig. Gen. Nelson Allaga, 3rd Marine Brigade commander; Navy Capt. Feliciano Angue, then head of Naval Task Force 62 operating in Tawi-Tawi and now Navy operations chief; Marine lieutenant colonels Melvin Pelonia and Elmer Estopin based in Tawi-Tawi and Sulu, respectively; Army Colonels Rey Arde and Aminkandra Undug; and a certain Colonel Pereno and Captain Perez.

It’s uncertain if there was a military component to the so-called “Antidote Group,” which a senator’s adviser fi rst heard of weeks before the polls. While fretting over the absence of a K-4 senatorial campaign plan, the adviser was assured by a presidential consultant, “Don’t worry, there’s an antidote.”

Rufino also referred to an “Antidote Group” in his marginal note to Arroyo when he endorsed Garcillano as elections commissioner. Wrote Rufino: “He (Garcillano) will be a great asset to you. He has proven track record and can deliver! Part…The Antidote Group.” The senator’s adviser says the Antidote Group was often offered as the solution whenever the campaign had problems. Whoever made up the group remains a mystery to the adviser, but its purpose has since become clear. “Our own quick count showed some election returns did not match the certificates of canvass,” says the adviser. But many of these somehow got “cured.”