IT is a crowded and colourful field as the Philippines finalised the candidates of its 2022 election.
The Southeast Asian nation of 110 million will hold polls on May 9, 2022, for positions ranging from the president down to governors, mayors and local officials, which will see 18,000 elected posts being contested.
Despite the electoral carnival engulfing the Asean member state, all eyes will be on who will be in the fray of the president's post and likely to come out on top.
Heading the list are the scions of two former presidents, Ferdinand Marcos Sr and Rodrigo Duterte.
Presidential aspirant and former senator Ferdinand Marcos Jr, or Bongbong, is vying for the president's post, while Sara Duterte-Carpio, the outgoing Mayor of Davao, will go for the vice-president's post in one of the most anticipated elections in recent times.
Marcos Jr will contest under Partido Federal ng Pilipinas (PFP), while Duterte-Carpio will contest under the Lakas-CMD banner, which has produced one president — Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.
With the 43-year-old first daughter's move to contest the vice-president's post, Marcos Jr immediately adopted Duterte-Carpio as his running mate choice for the election, realising her political popularity.
In the 2016 Philippine presidential election, Lakas-CMD backed the candidacy of Duterte and Marcos Jr for president and vice-president, respectively.
In the polls, Duterte won and Marcos lost to Liberal Party candidate Leni Robredo.
Marcos Jr and Duterte-Carpio are among the 97 presidential candidates, of which 15 are political party nominees, while the rest are running as independents.
Another 28 candidates are contesting the vice-presidential post, involving 14 party and independent nominations.
All candidates filed their papers with the Philippines Election Commission, which was certified on Nov 15.
Other front runners for the president's post are former police general Senator Panfilo Lacson, known for his anti-pork barrel advocacy, actor and Manila mayor Isko Moreno, retired pugilist Senator Manny Pacquiao, and Robredo.
The Philippine president functions as the head of state and the head of government in a nation with a plural multi-party system.
Duterte, 76, is ineligible for re-election as he is limited to a single term of six years, under the 1987 Philippine Constitution, adopted following the People's Power Revolution, or Edsa Revolution, which toppled the dictatorship of Marcos Sr.
The outgoing president, however, is eligible to run for other posts, including for vice-president, senator, congressman, mayor or governor. He has opted to contest for a Senate seat.
In the vice-president's election, apart from Duterte-Carpio emerging as a leading front runner, the others in the fray are television host and former Manila mayor Jose "Lito" Livioko Atienza Jr, who is the running mate of Pacquiao; cardiologist Doc Willie Ong , who ran for the Senate in 2019 and has a strong social media presence, who is Moreno's running mate; three-term Senator Kiko Pangilinan, who is Robredo's running mate; and, television presenter and Philippine Senate President Vicente Tito Sotto who will be Lacson's running mate
In the Philippines, the president and vice-president are elected in separate contests.
This will be the 17th direct presidential election and 16th vice-presidential election in the Philippines since 1935.
Opinion polling conducted on the presidential election by pollsters at the end of candidacy filing showed Marcos Jr leading the field.
Polling by the Issues and Advocacy Centre, Publicus Asia and Social Weather Stations between Sept 7 and Oct 23 showed Marcos Jr in the lead.
A poll by RP-Mission and Development Foundation between Oct 17 and 26 found Moreno taking lead, with Marcos Jr being the close second.
The Philippine Star, on its online portal Philstar, said front runners in surveys for top posts this early in the election season usually lose, as voter preference typically shifts the closer election day approaches.
In the 2016 presidential polls, the website said it was then vice-president Jejomar Binay who was the early front runner, but Senator Grace Poe later on followed and then Davao City Mayor Duterte, overtaking the surveys up to the election date.
Online portal Rappler said alone, neither Moreno nor Robredo nor, for that matter, Pacquiao possess enough political support to combat a steady alliance between Marcos Jr's support in the north and Duterte-Carpio's backing in the south
It said with the Marcos Jr and Duterte-Carpio names coming together, it establishes a brand that appeals to a much broader spectrum of the Philippine electorate, which they could not have otherwise accomplished in isolation.
The portal adds that Duterte-Carpio lends much to Marcos Jr' political machinery, securing difficult votes in Mindanao, where Marcos Jr lagged behind Robredo and Alan Peter Cayetano in the 2016 election.
The writer is NST news editor
The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of the New Straits Times