Philippines votes amid Marcos-Duterte feud
MANILA
Millions of Filipinos braved long lines and soaring temperatures Monday to vote in a mid-term election seen as choosing sides in an explosive feud between President Ferdinand Marcos and impeached Vice President Sara Duterte.
With temperatures hitting 34 degrees Celsius in some places, George Garcia, head of the Commission on Elections (Comelec), said some voting machines were "overheating."
"It's slowing the voting process," he told reporters at a prison in southern Manila where inmates were casting ballots.
"Due to the extreme heat, the ink [on the ballots] does not dry immediately, and the ballot ends up stuck on the scanners," Garcia said, adding officials in some areas were resorting to aiming electric fans at the machines.
Monday’s election will decide more than 18,000 posts, from seats in the House of Representatives to hotly contested municipal offices.
It is the battle for the Senate, however, that carries potentially major implications for the presidential election in 2028.
The 12 senators chosen nationally will form half the jury in an impeachment trial of Duterte later this year that could see her permanently barred from public office.
Sara Duterte, who cast her vote at a high school in her family's southern bailiwick of Davao, will need nine votes in the 24-seat Senate to preserve any hope of a future presidential run.
Heading into Monday, seven of the candidates polling in the top 12 were endorsed by Marcos, while four were aligned with his vice president.
