MANILA -- The Commission on Elections on Monday began asking 95 senatorial aspirants to explain why they should not be considered as nuisance candidates for next year’s midterm elections.

One petition initiated by the poll body’s law department questioned the “financial capability” of one Angelo De Alban, a lawyer and a teacher, to run a nationwide campaign.

“While such is a noble way to earn a living, it is most respectfully submitted that absent clear proof of respondent’s financial capability, respondent will not be able to sustain the financial rigors of waging a nationwide campaign,” said the petition signed by law department chief Maria Norina Tangaro-Casingal.

De Alban said the petition surprised him “because I know for a fact I’m qualified.”

“(It’s) insulting on the part of teachers and lawyers at the same time because yung iba, pinapayagan nilang tumakbo without any actual qualification but lawyers and teachers are qualified and they consider them nuisance candidates?” he told ABS-CBN News shortly after picking up a copy of the petition.

“Yun ang masakit e (It's hurtful). We are considered nuisance candidates.”

De Alban, who teaches at the University of Santo Tomas, was among the 152 aspirants who filed their certificates of candidacy for senator earlier this month.

BITTER PILL

But the Comelec will still purge the list of so-called nuisance candidates or those who intend to “put the election process in mockery or disrepute.”

Under the law, the poll body can also cancel the candidacy certificate of those running to “cause confusion among voters” because their names are similar those of legitimate candidates.

The Comelec also considers acts that “clearly demonstrate that the candidate has no bona fide intention to run” for a particular office “and thus prevent a faithful determination of the true will of the electorate.”

In its petition against De Alban, the Comelec law department acknowledged that “the right to vote and be voted for shall not be dependent upon the wealth of the individual concerned.”

But “reality is a bitter pill” the lawyer “has to swallow,” it said.

De Alban said running a nationwide campaign should not involve only money, citing his “network” of supporters from among fellow lawyers and educators in other parts of the country.

Comelec spokesman James Jimenez said there were more “unknowns” who had filed their candidacy certificates for senator for next year’s election, but who could “not be readily regarded as a nuisance.”

The participation of such aspirants, he said, indicated a “certain amount of trust that the system will reflect the voice of the people.”