Archive - Top Stories

By ELLEN TORDESILLAS and YOUTHVOTEPHILIPPINES WHATEVER the final outcome of the tightly contested vice presidential race, Makati Mayor Jejomar Binay has made history by being the first local official to be possibly catapulted to a top national position, just a breath away from the presidency. Unlike another former mayor, Joseph Estrada, Binay bypassed Congress in his quest

By ARTHA KIRA PAREDES BANGUED, Abra.— A barangay captain of Pidigan town was shot on the nape Thursday evening, just a few days before the election period comes to an end. Pangtud Barangay Captain Rodolfo Bragas was shot by a certain Noli Marsan and three other companions in his house while he was writing a barangay report.

By LEYTE-SAMAR DAILY EXPRESS TACLOBAN CITY.—Vote-buying marred the conduct of the special elections in Barangay Buenos Aires, Pagsanghan town, Samar Thursday with amounts reportedly reaching as high as P20,000 per voter. Jose Nick Mendros,   Commission on Elections regional director, admitted the Comelec could not do anything to prosecute those responsible for vote-buying as no

By VIOLETA M. GLORA Mindanews ILIGAN CITY.—Reports of fraud and violence marked the special elections held in Lanao del Sur Thursday as vote-buying proliferated, with the price pegged at anywhere from P10,000 to 15,000 per family. This was the report made by the Citizens Coalition for ARMM Electoral Reform (Citizens CARE), an election watchdog in

By CAROLYN O. ARGUILLAS Mindanews DAVAO CITY.–The Philippine government and Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) ended nine years of peace negotiations under the Arroyo administration with the signing of a “Declaration of Continutiy for Peace Negotiations” and the “Guidelines on the Humanitarian, Rehabilitation and Development Component of the International Monitoring Team” shortly after noon today

By MINDANEWS DAVAO CITY .—The “new” set of Mindanao’s top officials is not exactly new. Of 25 Mindanao governors, 16 are reelected, two are brothers of the outgoing governors and the rest are “recycled” or those who ran for other posts after completing, usually, a nine-year, three-term service. Of 33 city mayors, 19 are reelected,

By E.V. CARREON GUIMBA, Nueva Ecija.—At least 60 precinct count optical scan (PCOS) machines that went missing here after the May 10 elections are now at the Commission on Elections provincial office, with Smartmatic unable to explain how it lost control of these machines. The Comelec ordered the PCOS machines brought to its provincial office

By LEYTE-SAMAR DAILY EXPRESS TACLOBAN CITY.–The special elections supposed to be conducted in a village in Pagsanghan town, Samar province today was reset to June 3. Samar elections supervisor Corazon Montallana said rescheduling of the special polls in Barangay Buenos Aires, which has a voting population of 492, will give the poll body more time to

By ARTHA KIRA PAREDES BANGUED, Abra.— Police have found the body of a man buried in the backyard of Tineg Mayor Edwin Crisologo’s residence in Barangay Ubbog here Wednesday night. The police report said the team that responded to a text message uncovered a “male cadaver” from a  “garbage pit approximately two-feet” deep.

By LUZ RIMBAN THE Commission on Elections is partly to blame for election-related violent incidents because it acted too late to put critical areas, including the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), under its control, said an election watchdog group. The Consortium on Electoral Reform (CER) said the Comelec ran out of time to implement

By MELVIN PURZUELO Green Forum – Western Visayas ILOILO CITY. — The May 10 elections saw the clash of political dynasties in this city, leading to the downfall of the powerful Gonzalez family. Former Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez Sr., known here as the “King,” lost the mayoralty contest to Vice Mayor Jed Mabilog while his

By RYAN ROSAURO MindaNews MARAWI CITY.— Election results transmitted to the Commission on Elections (Comelec) central server after the May 10 polls include those from nine ghost precincts in Lanao del Sur. One of these precincts is located in a ghost barangay named Padian Torogan which, in Maranao, means cemetery.

By RYAN ROSAURO MindaNews ILIGAN CITY.—Maranao leaders in Lanao del Sur have opposed the holding of special elections in seven towns on May 28 because the date falls on a Friday, an Islamic holy day. “We are appealing that it be moved to another date. We hope the Comelec would recognize our religious sensibilities,” said

By LEYTE-SAMAR DAILY EXPRESS TACLOBAN CITY- The Commission on Elections in Eastern Visayas is preparing to hold special elections in Barangay Buenos Aires in Pagsanghan town in Samar on Saturday. Samar Elections Supervisor Corazon Montallana said the event will be closely watched by the contending parties because it will determine the eventual winners.

By LORENA CANJA-NAVALLASCA PROCESS Foundation-Panay Inc. SAN JOSE, Antique. — As in many parts of the country in the recent elections, Antique voters showed that being part of a political dynasty is not necessarily a stumbling block to victory. Elected governor of the province was incumbent congressman Exequiel Javier (Lakas-Kampi). His son Paolo won as

By PAULINE DYCOCO THE counting of votes may have been quick, but the country’s first-ever automated elections were far from being successful. This was the sentiment of outgoing Isabela Gov. Grace Padaca, who lost her reelection bid to Faustino Dy III, a scion of the powerful “Dy Dynasty” in the province. “Define successful? Just because

BY CHIT ESTELLA THE Center for People Empowerment in Governance (CenPEG) said yesterday it would consider asking the Supreme Court to compel the Commission on Elections and Smartmatic to produce documents and other materials needed to determine whether fraud and other irregularities have been committed in the elections. The proposal to apply for a writ

By JULES M. BENITEZ MindaNews BONGAO, Tawi-tawi.—After last Monday’s election, the hotly contested Turtle Islands in this province is now under the control of an ally of the governor, who has come under fire for buying one of the islands. The Turtle Islands are a group of seven islets just a hop away from Sandakan

The Commission on Elections proclaimed nine winning senators Saturdays at the Philippine International Convention Center.

By ARTHA KIRA PAREDES BANGUED, Abra.–“Losing our father is the most painful and traumatic experience of our childhood years,” 10-year-old Marian Mae Acena told those who attended her father’s burial mass at the San Lorenzo Ruiz Church in Zone 3 here on Saturday morning. Mae-Mae is the daughter of Mario Acena, 33, a supporter of

THE Supreme Court has junked a petition filed by First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo, which sought to dismiss the damage suit filed against him by a group of journalists. In a minute resolution, the Supreme Court ruled that the Court of Appeals did not commit a reversible error in sustaining the ruling of Judge Zenaida

By BOOMA CRUZ Courtesy of PROBE PROFILES ON election eve, media tore down the windows of Precinct 175-A of Sitio Alto, Barangay Central Azucarera de Tarlac Elementary School. The two adjacent giant square casements with horizontal rails blocked the perfect view of the precinct count optical scan (PCOS) machine stationed at the voting center. Leading presidential

By YVONNE T. CHUA, LUZ RIMBAN and AVIGAIL OLARTE MONDAY’S election was supposed to have ushered Filipino voters into the modern age of computerized voting, but the results show the country will remain stuck with feudal-style politics as dynasties secured elective positions at the provincial, congressional and local levels. In at least 34 of the

By ELLEN TORDESILLAS THE May 10, 2010 elections gave Liberal Party‘s Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III overwhelming victory, but it was the performance of former President Joseph Estrada in the race that amazed many. As of Thursday, with 89 percent of the votes in, the Commission on Elections Count gave Aquino 13.8 million votes followed by

MONDAY’S elections will likely register the highest rate of deaths compared to the country’s previous polls, a nongovernment election monitor said Thursday. The Consortium on Electoral Reforms, which is behind the initiative Vote Peace, also said this year’s polls was the “most explosive.” Twelve grenades exploded on election day, mostly in Maguindanao’s second district and

RYAN ROSAURO, VIOLETA M. GLORIA, AND JULES BENITEZ Mindanews and VERA Files THE automated election system failed to bring change to Lanao del Sur traditional warlord and goon country of Mindanao where violence and a low voter turnout marked the May 10 elections, as they did in the past. The police, military and election watchdog

By VIOLETA M. GLORIA Mindanews ILIGAN CITY. – The conduct of elections in Lanao del Norte can be considered generally peaceful despite delays in the transmission of results from 11 hinterland towns, the Pastoral Parish Council for Responsible Voting (PPCRV) said. Fr.Rey Pati-an, provincial PPCRV head, said the peaceful election could be attributed to well-behaved

By ARTHA KIRA PAREDES BANGUED, Abra.—Although the police considered the elections in Abra “peaceful,” volunteers for the church-based election watch group here have dwindled in number following reports of threats and intimidation of candidates and their armed followers before and during elections. The number of volunteers has decreased compared to those in the previous years

By ELLEN TORDESILLAS and MARK JOSEPH UBALDE THE Commission on Elections on Tuesday decided to stop releasing updates of last Monday’s elections on the request of lawyers of some presidential and vice presidential bets. Comelec Commissioner Lucenito Tagle said the en banc was supposed to have issued another update after Tuesday morning’s press briefing, but

By YOUTHVOTEPHILIPPINES WITH the technical glitches in yesterday’s  first automated polls, the random manual audit (RMA) becomes more crucial in ensuring the credibility of election results. The Commission on Elections has released Resolution 8837 on the conduct of the RMA after rejecting calls from various groups to conduct a parallel manual count last April 29.