Philippine Election Unofficial Results

On Monday, May 10th, Pilipinos braved humid temperatures of 100+ degrees, and endured up to 5 hours wating in line to cast their votes in the Philippine National Elections.  It is estimated that 80-85% of the 50M registered voters cast a vote in this year’s elections.  With about 90% of the votes counted, it is all but official that Senator Benigno Simeon “Noynoy” Aquino III will become the next President of the Philippines.  All of the presidential candidates, with the exception of current runner-up  (and former President) Joseph "Erap" Estrada, have conceded to Sen. Aquino.  With the last vote tally by Commission on Elections (COMELEC) showing Aquino to have over 13.7M votes, the only thing left to do is to have the Philippine Congress declare "Noynoy" as the official winner.

p>Even with Estrada's impeachment, conviction, and subsequent pardon, he has managed to secure second place in the electoral bid, with over 8.6M votes for president.  Manny Villar follows in third place with over 4M votes. 

Although Sen. Aquino hold's a huge lead in the unofficial results, Estrada doesn't seem to want to concede so easily. GMA News reports that Erap plans to "disclose evidence of alleged discrepancies" in the voting, summarizing that some of the manual counts do not match up with the electronic counts by the PCOS (Precinct Count Optical Scan) machines.  Estrada's representatives say that he would not challenge the results, but merely ensure that the person named President is "the right one," whatever that is supposed to mean.

Video Courtesy of Al Jazeera English: Inside Story - A new leader for the Philippines

The race for the Vice-Presidential seat is a lot closer, but Jejomar Binay leads Manuel Roxas by approximately 800,000 votes. The Roxas camp still believe that he can pull away with the victory, but with a very slim margin.  It is estimated that more than 5M votes remain to be counted.  Just like the Presidential results, the official winner must be declared by Congress once a canvassing of the results has been completed.

While she will no longer be President, Incumbent Gloria Macapagal Arroyo is not completely out of the picture.  She ran, and has won, a congressional seat, for the 2nd District of Pampanga, from which she hopes to become House Speaker. On Sen. Aquino's agenda, once he is declared the President, would be to investigate Arroyo for corruption. During the campaign process, Aquino distinguished himself from Arroyo by running on an anti-corruption platform. If indeed she becomes House Speaker, the Christian Science Monitor reports her position "would make her the focus of opposition to the new president, and so make any investigation appear to be an act of political spite." There are other concerns that she is working to maintain a strong influence within the government, by appointing an ally as Chief Justice to the Supreme Court to replace the current and retiring Chief Justice.  The Supreme Court will then have 14 out of 15 Arroyo-appointees sitting on the bench. There is also fear her allies in Congress would push for a change the Constitution substituting a British-style Parliamentary System for the current system, effectively putting Arroyo, or any other House Speaker, in power.

Elsewhere in the country, boxing fans will note that Manny Pacquiao has been elected to represent Sarangani province. The reports that a November 6th or 13th fight will be set at Cowboy's Stadium against an opponent that is yet to be determined.

Furthermore, the elections have resulted in many well-known names in politics.  Vilma Santos is re-elected as governor in Batangas, Georgina "Manay Gina" de Venecia  wins her congressional bid in Pangasinan, Lucy Torres-Gomez also wins her congressional bid in Leyte, Imelda Marcos wins her congressional bid in Laoag, and Jinggoy Estrada and Bong Revilla both earned Senate seats.