Manila
With less than 60 days left before Filipinos go to the polls in the country’s first fully automated elections, there are growing concerns over transparency and the risk that the system will break down leading to political instability.
The announcement on Wednesday that President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo can name the country’s next chief justice has added to the growing uncertainty. Nine of the country’s 15 Supreme Court justices voted in favour of allowing the outgoing president to nominate a replacement to the chief justice, Reynato Puno.
Senate president Juan Ponce Enrile has warned that if the elections fail and there is no elected president, vice president and congress by June 30 – the day when Mrs Arroyo’s term ends – the military will be forced to step in and appoint a transitional administration.
Mr Enrile is no amateur player when it comes to Philippine politics. As one of the former leader Ferdinand Marcos’s trusted lieutenants he faked his own assassination to help usher in martial law on September 21, 1972. He later became a key player in the People Power movement, which eventually toppled Marcos in February 1986.
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