MANILA, Philippines – Former senator and losing vice presidential candidate Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has no evidence to back his election protest against Vice President Leni Robredo, a lawyer said yesterday.

Romulo Macalintal, counsel for Robredo, issued the statement after Marcos filed a petition before the Supreme Court (SC) stopping the Commission on Elections (Comelec) from releasing 1,356 “unused” vote-counting machines (VCMs) to Smartmatic-Total Information Management Corp.

Marcos said the unused VCMs should be subjected to technical examination because “the possibility of the switching of the VCMs and SD cards could not be ruled out.”

“It should not merit any further action by the Presidential Electoral Tribunal since the VCMs were not part and parcel of his election protest,” Macalintal said.

“This shows that Marcos is merely fishing for evidence. To subject said VCMs to technical examination is an admission that he is speculating and has no evidence on hand,” he added.

Macalintal cited the high court’s ruling on the case of Balindong vs Comelec on Aug. 9, 1996, where the SC did not allow the technical examination of certain election documents as it found that the petitioner merely wanted a technical examination to prove poll fraud.

“Marcos should not be allowed to fish for evidence and speculate on the results of his request for technical examination of the VCMs, which were not even used during the elections,” Macalintal said.

“Clearly, he is shooting in the dark trying to create evidence to support his baseless poll protest,” he added.

Robredo won against Marcos in the vice presidential race by more than 200,000 votes last May.