Voting began on Monday in the Philippines’ Muslim-majority south under heightened security after three people were killed and 15 wounded in violence on the eve of the region’s first parliamentary election, Hiru News reported.
The Commission on Elections placed Cotabato City under its control after the Sunday violence, when an argument at a polling station erupted in gunfire.
Al Jazeera reported further incidents on Monday morning: four more people, including a police officer, sustained gunshot wounds at another polling station shortly before 7am, an improvised bomb injured the person carrying it, and a gun was fired in a separate incident with no one hurt.
Election Commission Chairperson George Erwin Garcia condemned the violence but said polling across the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) had been generally peaceful, despite logistical problems including the reprinting of ballots to replace pre-shaded ones that had been intercepted.
Al Jazeera reports that the town of Maluso in Basilan was also placed under commission control after pre-shaded ballots were found in 36 of 68 precincts, with reprinting ordered and voting there delayed.
What the vote decides
The election fills seats for party-list representatives, district representatives and sectoral seats. BARMM is the Philippines’ only region governed under a parliamentary system, and this is its first parliamentary vote since the region was established in 2019.
The two sources differ slightly on the electorate: Hiru puts it at nearly 2.4 million registered voters, Al Jazeera at more than 2.3 million eligible. Precincts were due to close at 7pm local time (1100 GMT), though Garcia said some might stay open until 9pm because of delayed openings.
The vote completes a transition set in motion by the 2014 peace agreement between Manila and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), the country’s largest Muslim separatist group, and the law that followed granting the Muslim-majority south greater political and economic powers.
That conflict killed more than 120,000 people and displaced about 2 million, and helped extremist groups gain a foothold in the region — a trajectory that peaked in the 2017 siege of Marawi City by fighters linked to the Islamic State group.
International partners and peace monitors regard the election as a key test of whether the autonomy granted under the 2014 deal can be sustained through elected institutions.
What officials said
President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. urged voters to take part in what he called a “defining moment” for the region and the country.
“The election marks a milestone in the continuing journey of BARMM towards lasting peace, democratic governance and meaningful self-determination,” he said in a video message.
Garcia framed the vote in similar terms. “These elections stand on generations of Bangsamoro struggle for homeland, identity, and self-determination, in the face of dispossession, marginalisation, conflict and sacrifice,” he said, pledging to charge anyone attempting to incite violence or engage in vote-buying.
Al Jazeera correspondent Barnaby Lo reported from the region that “elections in this part of the Philippines have been marred by violence for as long as I can remember.”
The autonomous region spans parts of Mindanao, the Philippines’ second-largest island, and a chain of dozens of small islands to the west historically associated with piracy and banditry. Parties led by former separatist commanders are among those contesting.
Not reported
Neither source identifies the three people killed in Cotabato City, says whether anyone has been arrested over the shooting, or explains who intercepted the pre-shaded ballots or how. Neither gives turnout figures, a result timetable, or the number of seats being contested. Neither reports how many precincts were affected by delayed openings, or what security forces were deployed.
