ELECTION returns from 36 of 55 precincts in Pagalungan town in Maguindanao all the more cast doubt on the credibility of election results as reflected in the provincial certificate of canvass (CoC) heralding an incredible 12-0 sweep of the senatorial contest in favor of administration candidates.

The Pagalungan ERs, mysteriously set aside and left uncanvassed until only last Friday, show that all 37 senatorial bets did garner votes, contrary to the results in the provincial CoC submitted by provincial supervisor Lintang Bedol where 18 candidates received “statistically improbable” zero votes.

As far as voting pattern went, the Pagalungan voting results also more closely reflect the outcome of elections in the five other provinces of the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao, with Team Unity’s Jamalul Kiram topping the field with 2,732 votes. Kiram also led the senatorial race in Lanao del Sur, Sulu and Tawi-Tawi while placing a strong second in Basilan and Shariff Kabunsuan.

In the Pagalungan tally, TU’s Juan Miguel Zubiri was in seventh place, which is somehow consistent with his showing in the other ARMM provincial results: fourth in Lanao del Sur, fifth in Shariff Kabunsuan, sixth in Sulu, eighth in Basilan, and 11th in Tawi-Tawi. This only serves to further cast the three-term Bukidnon congressman’s first-place finish in the Maguindanao CoC, obtaining almost 100 percent of the votes cast, in a really suspicious light.

For obvious reasons, Zubiri’s lawyer, George Garcia, tries to paint it differently, arguing that the former Bukidnon representative’s lead in Pagalungan is the reflection of the election results in other areas in Maguindanao. “It only strengthens our claim that Maguindanao is an administration bailiwick,” he said, adding that Pagalungan is the “best indication” that no irregularities took place in Maguindanao.

But if that were the case, then the other towns in Maguindanao would not have zero votes for non-administration candidates as Bedol insists, though Zubiri’s lawyer would have people believe that zero votes are probable because the province is an administration stronghold. The other ARMM provinces are supposed administration bailiwicks too but the voting results there did not have zero votes for the 18 opposition and independent candidates.

The Pagalungan results even tend to debunk the claim that the province is an administration bailiwick since six Genuine Opposition and two independent candidates landed in the Magic 12 as against only four from the administration.

While Zubiri ranked higher than his bitter rival for the 12th and last Senate seat, GO’s Aquilino Pimentel III, in ARMM, his vote-margin in each of the provinces, except in Lanao del Sur (where Pimentel had a lead of over 7,000 votes over Zubiri), was not as huge as purported in the Maguindanao CoC.

The Pagalungan ERs could, in fact, be a better indicator of Zubiri’s lead over Pimentel in the Muslim Mindanao region as he only had 476 votes more than the opposition bet. Zubiri’s widest lead over Pimentel in ARMM was in Shariff Kabunsuan at over 30,000 votes, followed by over 15,000 votes in Sulu, close to 12,000 votes in Basilan, and almost 8,500 votes in Tawi-Tawi. That lead, however, still proved short to overcome Pimentel’s lead of over 110,000 votes in the national tally.

So if it weren’t a catch-up measure, how could Zubiri have led Pimentel by almost 130,000 votes in Maguindanao, whose CoC was the last from ARMM to be canvassed by the national board of canvassers?

Then, there’s the issue of incredibly high voter turnouts. The turnout in the recently canvassed results in Pagalungan’s 36 precincts at 85 percent (or 5,988 votes cast out of the total number of registered voters of 7,013), though high, is a more statistically probable outcome compared to the unusually high voter turnout in almost all Maguindanao towns. Registering the highest turnouts were Shariff Aguak (99.29), Datu Piang (99.28 percent), Mangundadatu (99.12), and Talayan (99.06 percent), while 16 other towns had turnouts no lower than 92 percent.

Interestingly, Pagalungan and South Upi (77 percent) were the only towns that did not have voter turnouts above 90-percent.