Apparently displeased by the newspaper ads about election protest, Senate Majority Floor Leader Juan Miguel Zubiri urged the Senate Electoral Tribunal (SET) to immediately resolve the election protest by Atty. Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III against him.

According to Zubiri, only the decision of the SET will settle once and for all who is the real winner between him and Pimentel III.

Zubiri made the appeal in reaction to newspaper advertisements where his rival Pimentel claimed to have won his electoral protest process.

It seems, Zubiri said, that Pimentel III, son of Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel Jr does not understand the meaning of the word process.

He said that aside from violation of contempt order, the newspaper ads put up by the younger Pimentel was quite blatant that is meant to put undue pressure on the SET and embarrass me as the duly elected senator of the country and as Majority Floor Leader of the Senate.

“I will appeal to the SET to make the decision because if there is probable cause that electoral fraud was committed against me, Mr. President. I have the right to know and open the ballot boxes even of NCR alone, so we will know the true and actual count of the member of this august chamber. That is my appeal Mr. President. And I put this on the record because I will have to answer the ads of Mr. Pimentel, and I request Mr. President that the SET does not charge me again for contempt because it’s becoming to be very expensive on my part.”

In the same advertisement, Pimentel III claimed to have won in the 2007 Senatorial election which Zubiri countered saying he too was cheated in the said elections.

Apart from this, Zubiri said the SET had already given both of them a gag order on the case under SET Resolution 0720 dated February, 2008.

He recalled that that they were both cited in contempt last October 22,2009 under SET Resolution 0788 with very harsh language from SET and added he did not want to be cited for contempt again.