MANILA, Philippines – The Commission on Elections (Comelec) announced on Wednesday, May 11, that it will be holding special elections in 14 barangays in Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) due to “failure of elections.”

These barangays are in the municipalities of Butig, Binidayan, and Tubaran. Failure of elections were declared in 14 barangays due to stolen official ballots, violence resulting to damage of vote counting machines (VCMs), and a policeman stabbed while protecting VCMs.

There are a total of 8,295 registered voters affected by the failure of elections. In its resolution, the poll body said that special elections will be held because election for local positions in the concerned municipalities may still be affected given the number of registered voters there and so “as not to disenfranchise the voters.”

It was recommended that the special elections will be held on May 12 for Butig and Binidayan and May 15 for Tubaran.

Here is the list of barangays.

Here is a copy of the Comelec resolution @rapplerdotcom #PHVote #WeDecide pic.twitter.com/k2gyr5TLvY

— Bonz Magsambol (@bnzmagsambol) May 11, 2022

The special elections will not affect the standings of the national candidates. Partial, unofficial results of the 2022 elections show that dictator’s son Ferdinand Marcos Jr. is the winner of the presidential race, with a wide margin over his closest rival, Vice President Leni Robredo. Based on the latest results transmitted through the Comelec transparency server, Marcos Jr. has 31,090,403 votes while Robredo has 14,814,666 votes. – Rappler.com

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