Category: 2019 Political Map

2019 Political Map March 30, 2019December 7, 2019

2019 Bataan Province Candidates

With the entry of Ver Roque in the gubernatorial race, will 1Bataan still dominate the 2019 local elections in the Province of Bataan?

Bataan is a highly contested area primarily because of its being an economic zone and strategic geolocation providing easy access to Manila Bay and Subic Freeport, and because of its votes estimated to be 545,041 this year. Control of the province is therefore crucial particularly to investors and locators that make Bataan a highly industrialized province.

In general, local power is controlled by the Garcias starting from Enrique “Tet” Garcia down to the second or even third generation. Tet, who was convicted of graft, was succeeded by his son, Albert “Abet” Garcia. Other Garcias in power are Jose Enrique “Joet” S. Garcia III, the Congressional District Representative of the Second District; Maria Angela S. Garcia, the municipal mayor of Dinalupihan; and Francis Garcia, the city mayor of Balanga.

The Garcias took the local power from the Romans and the Payumos. After more than two decades, the Garcias are being threatened by Lilvir Roque, the mayor of Limay who made the municipal coffers grew fivefold from P200 million to P1 billion in just seven years from 2010 to 2017. The P 61 million municipal debt inherited by Roque was also fully paid with his sound economic policies. With these feat being trumpeted around Bataan, will the Garcias finally bow down to Roque and allow the latter to efficiently manage also the provincial coffers now marked by debts and red flags from the Commission on Audit?

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2019 Political Map February 9, 2019February 9, 2019

Davao del Sur and Davao City Candidates

Davao del Sur and Davao City has a combined voters of 1.25 million in 2016 making them a politically important area. It’s geographical location makes it also a significant entry point to other provinces not only in the region but also in the neighboring regions as well.

Davao del Sur is composed of one city and nine municipalities. These exclude the highly urbanized city of Davao, the hometown of incumbent president, Rodrigo Duterte.

For the 2019 elections, a total of 320 candidates are vying to fill-in 144 seats. These include the seats for the lone Congressional District of Davao del Sur and three Congressional Districts of Davao City.

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2019 Political Map February 7, 2019February 9, 2019

2019 Misamis Oriental and CDO Candidates

The province of Misamis Oriental in Mindanao is one of the economically important province in the Philippines. It is host to agricultural, forest, steel, metal, chemical, mineral, rubber and food processing
industries and is home to the 30 square kilometre PHIVIDEC Industrial Estate and the Mindanao International Container Port. It is also the location of Del Monte Philippines, the biggest pineapple exporter all over the Asia-Pacific region.

Within the province is the highly urbanized and independent city of Cagayan de Oro (CDO). The city is the regional center of Northern Mindanao and the location of major business establishments and factories in the region.

The province has two legislative districts, two component cities, and 23 municipalities. CDO, meanwhile, has two legislative districts.

For the 2019 elections, a total of 686 candidates filed their intentions to occupy the 288 positions in the province and the cities. The number of positions to be filled and the number candidates are as follows:

Position	Elective Seat	Candidates
Congressman	4	13
Governor	1	3
Vice Governor	1	3
Provincial Board	10	23
City Mayor	3	9
City Vice Mayor	3	6
City Councilor	36	97
Municipal Mayor	23	53
Municipal Vice Mayor	23	47
Municipal Councilor	184	432
TOTAL	288	686

Except for the First Congressional District of Misamis Oriental, all the districts have three candidates. Only Rolando Uy of CDO’s First District and Juliette Uy of the province’s Second District are seeking reelection. The list of candidates is here.

In the gubernatorial race, Bambi Emano is seeking another term and is facing two challengers. Vice governor Joey Pelaez is stepping down and hopes to be replaced by Jigjag Pelaez. To do so, Jigjag has two face also two contenders.

There are at least two contenders for every seat in the Provincial Board. Eleven will compete in the First District and twelve will also compete in the Second District.

The complete list of candidates for the provincial races is here.

In general, there are only two female candidates in every ten who filed their certificates of candidacies (COCs).

A plurality of those who filed their COCs are from the National Unity Party (NUP) followed by those who filed under Padayon Pilipino (Padayon), the political party of the Emanos.

The administration party — the Partido Demokratiko Pilipino-Lakas ng Bayan (PDP-Laban) – only comprise 12.4% of those who filed their COCs. There are even more independent candidates than those who aligned with PDP-Laban

Political Party	Candidates	Percent to total
NUP	196	28.57
Padayon	187	27.26
Independent	99	14.43
PDP-Laban	85	12.39
NP	51	7.43
PFP	27	3.94
UNA	26	3.79
CDPP	7	1.02
LP	3	0.44
Padayon/PDP-Laban	2	0.29
Lakas-CMD	1	0.15
PDSP	1	0.15
FFP	1	0.15
TOTAL	686	100

2019 Political Map February 5, 2019February 9, 2019

2019 Iloilo and Iloilo City Candidates

The province of Iloilo is one of the highly contested provinces in the Philippines having 1.35 million registered voters as of 2016. It is known as a Liberal Party (LP) bailiwick with Mar Roxas getting almost 70% of the total votes cast during the last presidential elections from both Iloilo City and the Iloilo province. Will this also be the case in the LP-backed candidates this midterm elections?

At the local level, 1,174 candidates are competing for 464 elective seats. There are 19 Congressional District Candidates for the five congressional districts in the province and the lone district of Iloilo City.

Arthur Defenso Jr., who has aligned with the administration party’s Partido Demokratiko Pilipino-Lakas ng Bayan (PDP-Laban) will be competing with four gubernatorial hopefuls. These are Nacionalista Party (NP) standard bearer Ferj Biron, Partido ng Dugong Dakilang Samahan gubernatorial candidate Esperidion Javier, and independent candidates Vicente Antay and Jonry Gargarita.

Vice Governor Christine Garin is seeking reelection under NP and is facing challenger Neil Tupas III of PD-Laban.

On the average, two candidates are likewise competing for each of the provincial board member seat.

(See the complete list of Provincial Candidates.)

In the Congressional elections, four candidates will compete in the First Congressional District and the Lone District of Iloilo City; two in the Third District; and, three in the Second and Fourth districts.

(See the complete list of Congressional Candidates.)

Ten candidates are likewise seeking to occupy the mayoralty posts of Iloilo City and Passi City while 104 are competing to occupy the 42 mayoralty seats of Iloilo’s municipalities.

Elective Position	Elective Seats	Candidates
Congressional Districts	6	19
Governor	1	5
Vice Governor	1	2
Provincial Board	10	20
City Mayors	2	10
City Vice Mayors	2	7
City Councilors	22	64
Municipal Mayors	42	104
Municipal Vice Mayors	42	95
Municipal Councilors	336	848
TOTAL	464	1174

The candidates in the province and cities of Iloilo are still male dominated. Only one in every four candidates are females.

Candidates bearing certifications from political parties are dominated by those from the Nacionalista Party with 435. PDP-Laban nominated candidates only account for 202 while those under the Partido Dugong Dakilang Samahan (PDDS) or Democratic Party of the Philippines (DPP) or a coalition of the two numbers 94.

The Liberal party (LP) which dominated Iloilo’s polls in 2016 only numbered to 34 which is almost the same as the local party, Abyan Ilonggo.

2019 Election Candidates, 2019 Political Map February 4, 2019February 4, 2019

Survey trends for Senatorial candidates

So, how are the senatorial candidates performing so far?

Pulse Asia has conducted a series of surveys measuring the preference of voters on the Senatorial candidates.

The Pulse Asia survey results for Senatorial preference, March -December 2018

Rappler noted that “(c)onsistently landing in the top are 5 of the 7 reelectionist senators: Grace Poe, Cynthia Villar, Juan Edgardo “Sonny” Angara, Nancy Binay, and Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III.”

“Poe has so far pulled away from everyone else in all surveys, but Villar seems to be gaining steam. Villar breached the 60% mark in the December 2018 survey when she garnered 66.6%, up by nearly 9 percentage points from September.”

The Pulse Asia results are almost similar to the survey results of the Social Weather Stations conducted last December.

For those interested in the numbers, the Pulse Asia results by survey and by candidate is as follows:

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2019 Political Map February 4, 2019February 4, 2019

Election Hotspots

Election hotspots are areas with election-related violence as declared by the Philippine National Police (PNP) and/or the Commission on Elections (Comelec).

PNP-declared hotspots are categorized into three:

Category 1: are areas which have had incidences of violence due to intense political rivalries.
Category 2: are areas with “serious armed threats” by “organized threat groups” . These groups may include private armies, New People’s Army, the Bangsamoro Independent Freedom Fighters, and Abu Sayyaf Group.
Category 3: are areas of grave concern with election-related violence involving officials vying for elected posts .

The list of election hotspots is as follows:

Region	Province	City/Municipality
Ilocos Region	La Union	Sudipen Balaoan
Cagayan Valley	Isabela	Jones
Central Luzon
CALABARZON	Batangas	Lemery
MIMAROPA	Oriental Mindoro	Roxas
Bicol Region	Albay	Daraga
	Masbate	Balud Dimasalang
Central Visayas
Western Visayas
Eastern Visayas
Zamboanga Peninsula	Zamboanga del Sur	Pagadian City
Northern Mindanao	Misamis Oriental	Cagayan de Oro City
Davao Region
SOCCSKSARGEN
Caraga
BARMM	Baslan	Hadji Mohammad Ajul Lantawan Tipo-Tipo
	Lanao del Sur	Marawi City Sultan Dumalondong
	Maguidanao	Mamasapano Shariff Aguak Shariff Saydona Mustapha Datu Unsay
	Cotabato City	Cotabato City
CAR
NCR

2019 Political Map January 2, 2019February 4, 2019

Candidates in the Bicol Region

The Bicol Region, or Region V, is located in the southern part of Luzon. It is composed of six provinces covering fourteen Congressional districts, seven cities, 108 municipalities, and 3,471 barangays.

As of October 17, 2018, the Commission on elections was able to register a total of 2,295 candidates for various positions in the region. The candidates are to fill-up a total of 1,250 seats for different positions.

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