Ang Bayan Ngayon | May 15, 2025
Progressive parties and democratic sectors launched various demonstrations and pickets across the country to criticize the blatant cheating and dirty elections on May 12. Kontra Daya and Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) led the actions.
On May 13, protesters marched to Manila Hotel where the Commission on Elections (Comelec) was conducting the national canvassing. They pointed out the numerous irregularities in the election recorded by Kontra Daya and other groups that monitored the election day.
As soon as precincts opened, complaints poured in regarding “inconsistencies” with the Miru machines. Many reported that their ballots were rejected due to “over-voting” despite voting the correct number of candidates and party-list groups for certain. Permanent markers having excessively thick ink also became an issue.
Kontra Daya reported that more than 50% of the complaints they received were related to malfunctioning machines, followed by illegal campaigning, vote buying, and missing names from voter lists. On election day itself, rampant Red-tagging and fake news dissemination were still reported.
Kontra Daya called holding Comelec accountable for these anomalies, along with its use of an un-audited version of the vote counting machines’ software (from version 3.4 to 3.5). They demanded manual vote counting to reveal the true results of the election.
Gabriela Women’s Party joined the protest, condemning the sudden deduction of 50,000 votes from their party during the automated counting. Because of this, Gabriela is on the verge of losing its position in the House of Representatives.
“We call on everyone who voted and supported us to act and fight for the sole women’s representation to return to Congress to advance the rights and welfare of women, children, LGBTQ+, and the nation,” the party’s first nominee Rep. Sarah Elago said.
According to Bayan, “in the six times of holding automated elections, the anomalies faced by the people during election periods seem to recur and even worsen.” This clearly shows that the AES can be easily manipulated to primarily serve the interests of the Marcos regime, as well as the Duterte faction.
The group asserted that “the current election has zero integrity.” They said we must act to hold the Marcos regime accountable for widespread and systematic election fraud.
On the same day, groups and parties also launched protests in Iloilo City and Cavite City. On May 14, Gabriela Women’s Party again protested at Manila Hotel and demonstrations were also held in Quezon City, Trece Martires City in Cavite, Batangas, Laguna, Aklan, and Cebu.
Source : https://philippinerevolution.nu/angbayan/groups-launch-protests-against-blatant-cheating-in-the-2025-elections/