Archive - Editor's Pick

By ELLEN T.TORDESILLAS IF the pre-election surveys are confirmed by Election Day votes, then it would be Rodrigo Duterte as president and Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos, Jr. as vice president. It would be slap in the face of President Aquino who refuses to see that the Filipino people’s attraction to the tough- talking Duterte is an

  Second of two parts (See Part 1: Like Arroyo, Aquino gov’t releases billions to LGUs before elections) ALCALA, Pangasinan — At the end of the newly opened section of the Tarlac-Pangasinan La Union Expressway, the one that exits at Rosales town, is a huge monstrosity of a structure, appearing empty and abandoned. It is supposed

First of two parts THE Aquino government has distributed some P10 billion pesos to select local government units mostly in Northern Luzon on the eve of the 2016 elections, repeating a practice employed by the Arroyo administration which President Aquino has repeatedly called a corrupt government. The funds represent the LGUs’ share from excise taxes

By LUZ RIMBAN SHARIFF Aguak, Maguindanao—Inside the vast Ampatuan estate here in Barangay Poblacion, behind the private mosque and posh homes of family members, and next to what used to be a stable for the family’s horses, rests Andal Ampatuan Sr., late patriarch of the clan that has ruled this town for the past 52

By MARIA FEONA IMPERIAL THE Commission on Elections has unveiled a new plan to make voting more accessible for persons with disabilities (PWDs) and senior citizens: emergency accessible polling places (EAPPs) in the form of makeshift tents. This after the poll body has canceled voting in malls due to practical and legal restrictions. (See Disability

  By MARIA FEONA IMPERIAL HIS exposés on Mayor Rodrigo Duterte’s supposed hidden wealth and wrongdoings as chief executive of Davao City might seem to have come too late as the presidential derby enters its homestretch. “Pero hindi po ako nagkulang (But I have done my part,)” said Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV who himself is running for

By VERLIE Q. RETULIN FIRST it was mall voting. Now it’s voter verification through headphones for people who have trouble seeing that won’t see the light of day on May 9. The Commission on Elections confirmed Thursday, four days before the election, that the headphones connected to vote-counting machines (VCM) will no longer be used by

By MARIA FEONA IMPERIAL PRESIDENTIAL race frontrunner Rodrigo Duterte, already facing a plunder case filed by Sen. Antonio Trillanes, has been slapped with yet another complaint, this time by disabillity groups and advocates. Disability advocates Ranilo Sorongon and Liza Martinez charged the Davao City mayor before the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) Friday with violating the

  BY ELLEN T. TORDESILLAS AS the official who supervised the first automated national elections in 2010, former Comelec Commissioner Gregorio Larrazabal wants the elections on Monday to succeed. That means for it to be accepted by the Filipino people as honest and credible. But there are a number of things that the current Comelec

By MARIA FEONA IMPERIAL WHEN polling places open on May 9, none of them would be in malls, as had been planned and hailed months before the elections.   On April 27, poll chief Andres Bautista announced that mall voting, a pilot project of his administration, will no longer push through. “I personally worked on

ASK all five presidential candidates about their plans for children and most of them would touch on providing classrooms and free lunch for undernourished kids. When it comes to transport issues, they would often discuss the worsening traffic problem in urban areas and their plans to solve it. This election season, road safety was almost

By TESS BACALLA MARILYN Sakiwat, 55, looked forward to coming home to the Philippines for good after years of working overseas, making up for lost time with her now grown-up children, and becoming a productive member of her community. This, after 26 years of toiling away in Hong Kong, hundreds of miles away from her simple