Elections 2016 Archives | Page 2 of 3

Santiago’s Health: A Political and Public Issue

UNLIKE HER four rivals for the presidency, Senator Miriam Defensor Santiago has generated considerably less steam. Having held only four campaign rallies with her running mate and having missed one Comelec-organized presidential debate, the three-time presidential contender has also done poorly in the surveys. But despite her minimal...

Reports on Local Elections: Scant and Superficial

THE CAMPAIGN period for the local elections officially began on March 27, Easter Sunday, as Filipinos capped the observance of Holy Week when the nation takes official break from work. The Commission on Elections (Comelec) prohibited any electoral activities on Holy Thursday and Good Friday which may have slowed...

Denying Voters the Right to Choose

A GREAT majority of the positions at stake in the May 9 elections this year are in local government.They exceed by the thousands the 26 national posts of 24 seats for senators and one seat each for vice president and president. The numbers alone demonstrate the importance of local government...

Campaign Trail Story Dominates Election News

REPORTS ON the campaign sorties of the 2016 presidential candidates continued to dominate the airtime allotted by TV news programs for election-related reports from March 6 to 19. CMFR monitored the primetime news programs of the three biggest Manila-based TV networks (ABS-CBN’s TV Patrol and TV Patrol Weekend, GMA-7’s 24...

The First Vice Presidential Debate: Refuting the “Spare Tire” Label

TAKING OFF from the first two presidential debates, the first-ever vice presidential debate in the country’s history offered the public a refreshing view of their electoral choices in 2016. On April 10, 2016, a different set of candidates engaged in the discussion of some of the country’s most pressing...

Perverting the Party-List System

THE PARTY-LIST system was institutionalized through Republic Act 7941 in 1995 to assure marginalized sectors of society of representation in Congress. The law uses the word “under-represented” to refer to these groups. Unlike other members of the House of Representatives, party-list nominees represent sectors instead of legislative districts. The...

Media Focus Still Limited to Presidential and Vice-Presidential Candidates

Discourse Analysis for the Second Monitoring Period (Feb. 21 to March 5) REPORTS ON the presidential and vice-presidential candidates dominated TV airspace three weeks into the official campaign period, with most of them focused on the conduct of their respective campaigns. The TV newscasts seemed like daily logs on...

More Substance in the Presidential Debates

BY MOST accounts, the presidential debate held Sunday night was a better version of the first one the month before. Granting that the debate often bordered on sounding and looking like a schoolyard brawl among the four candidates present, the discussion – or what passed for it –...

SC Ruling on Poe’s Disqualification: Media Succumbed to Speculation and Leaks

IN OTHER countries, particularly the United States, the judges or members of juries tasked to decide on a court case are sometimes sequestered so that they will have limited or no contact with the outside world that could influence their decision. That means no television, no newspapers, no...

Voter Receipts: Redundant or Necessary?

NOT TOO many Filipinos are aware that the law requires the Commission on Elections (Comelec) to provide the voter a receipt of his or her vote. The Comelec did not issue such a receipt in the first ever automated ballot in 2013. There were no complaints then. Section...