May polls to push through in war-torn Marawi, says Comelec exec

The May 2019 midterm elections will push through in war-torn Marawi City, two years after it was held under siege by the terrorist Maute group, a Commission on Elections official said Friday.

At a press conference, Comelec Director Teopisto Elnas Jr., deputy project director of the Project Management Office for the May 13 elections, said there will be 33 voting centers for Marawi City’s 63,014 registered voters under 106 clustered precincts.

“We will conduct elections in Marawi City, including doon sa Ground Zero. The voting centers will be set up near evacuation centers para makaboto sila,” Elnas said.

The Marawi siege in May to October 2017 saw the Maute group taking hostages, destroying communities, kill non-Muslims and engage government troops with relentless sniper fire.

The battle killed over a hundred people and destroyed properties worth at least P53 billion.

The siege on Marawi prompted President Rodrigo Duterte to place the entire  Mindanao under martial law in May 2017, a declaration that has been extended by Congress three times: by six months in July 2017, by one year in December 2017 and by another year in December 2018 based on the President's argument that rebellion is still ongoing in the region.

The President, however, drew flak this week over his comments that the government will not spend on the rehabilitation of Marawi anymore because the Maranaos who live there are businessmen/women who are rich.

Administration Senate bet Francis Tolentino, however, defended the President by saying that the President made the comments in a light moment and that the Chief Executive won’t abandon his mandate to rebuild Marawi City. — RSJ, GMA News