2022 Philippine presidential election


The Philippine presidential and vice presidential elections of 2022 are scheduled to be held on Monday, May 9, 2022, as part of that year's general elections. This will be the 17th direct presidential election in the Philippines since 1935 and the seventh presidential election since 1986.
Incumbent president Rodrigo Duterte is ineligible for re-election, pursuant to the 1987 Philippine Constitution. The position of president and vice president are elected separately, thus the two winning candidates could come from different political parties.
COMELEC Commissioner Rowena Guanzon has proposed voting by mail as an option in the elections, mainly due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Electoral system

According to the Constitution of the Philippines of 1987, the election is held every six years after 1992, on the second Monday of May. The incumbent president is term limited. The incumbent vice president may run for two consecutive terms. The first-past-the-post voting system is used to determine the winner: the candidate with the highest number of votes, whether or not one has a majority, wins the presidency. The vice presidential election is a separate election, is held on the same rules, and voters may split their ticket. Both winners will serve six-year terms commencing at noon on June 30, 2022, and ending on the same day six years later.

Background

In the 2016 presidential and vice presidential elections, Davao City mayor Rodrigo Duterte of Partido Demokratiko Pilipino-Lakas ng Bayan won against five other candidates, winning as president, while representative from Camarines Sur Leni Robredo of the Liberal Party won against Senator Bongbong Marcos and five others in the vice presidential election that is the closest margin since 1965, Marcos put the result under protest in the Presidential Electoral Tribunal.
In July 2016, Vice President Robredo was appointed to head the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council, but later resigned in December 2016 after she was told to stop attending all cabinet meetings, amid her criticism of the administration's bloody war on drugs. His allies afterwards attempted to impeach her, with the president calling to end the impeachment.
In the 17th Congress, the representative from Davao del Norte Pantaleon Alvarez was elected Speaker of the House of Representatives in July 2016. Two years later though, former president Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, who was the representative from Pampanga ousted Alvarez from the speakership. The president's allies said that the ouster was due to a squabble between Alvarez and Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte, the president's daughter, who the latter branded the former as from the opposition when she launched the Hugpong ng Pagbabago, a regional political party in the Davao Region where both Davao del Norte and Davao City are a part of.
In the 2019 midterm Senate election, the opposition fielded the Otso Diretso coalition, while the administration fielded their slate under the Hugpong ng Pagbabago banner. Hugpong won 9 of the 12 seats contested, while Otso Diretso won no seats. Cynthia Villar, wife of defeated 2010 presidential candidate Manuel Villar, topped the election, while 2013's topnotcher and 2016 defeated presidential candidate Grace Poe finished second. While Sara Duterte's Hugpong won in the Davao Region, they notably failed to unseat Alvarez, and PDP–Laban defeated Hugpong candidates for governor of Davao del Norte, and the province's both seats in the House of Representatives.
On Marcos's electoral protest against Robredo, the Presidential Electoral Tribunal released on October 2019 the report on Marcos's pilot provinces of Camarines Sur, Iloilo and Negros Oriental, and showed that Robredo increased her lead by 15.742 votes. The tribunal voted to defer on deciding on the protest, and instead proceeded with Marcos's plea to nullify the votes from the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao provinces of Basilan, Lanao del Sur and Maguindanao. Those who dissented the decision said that the protest should have been dismissed, as Marcos failed to recover votes from his 3 pilot provinces, citing the rules of the tribunal; they were overruled when the others said that Marcos's plea on the ARMM provinces should also be resolved.
A couple of weeks later, the president challenged Robredo to co-chair the Inter-Agency Committee on Anti-Illegal Drugs, the office that oversees the war on drugs, along with the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency chief, which she accepted. A week later, Duterte said that he will fire Robredo if she shares state secrets about the drug war. Several days later, Duterte said he cannot trust Robredo, after she asked the government for a list of high value targets in the drug war. Robredo replied that "He should tell me straight if he wants me out." Senator Francis Pangilinan of the Liberal Party said that Duterte could have fired Robredo instead of belittling her. A day later, Duterte fired Robredo as co-chair of the ICAD, with Presidential Spokesman Salvador Panelo shared that she spoke with foreigners, was asking for the scope of her powers and was among those daring the President to fire her, along with Senator Francis Pangilinan.
In June 2020, American boxing promoter Bob Arum said that Senator Manny Pacquiao confided to him that he will run for president in 2022. Pacquiao later denied talking about politics with Arum.
After remarks by actress Sharon Cuneta on July 2020 saying she hopes Robredo will succeed Duterte in 2022 so that "decency" will be restored in the country, Robredo said that she has no plans yet of running in 2022.

Candidates

Official candidates

The Commission on Elections is expected to publish the list of official candidates by January 2022.

Declared candidates

No one has declared his or her intentions of running for either president or vice president.

Potential candidates

Various personalities have directly and indirectly hinted on the possibility of running for president or vice president in the 2022 presidential elections. In other cases, sources have hinted on the possibility of certain candidates to run for president or vice president in 2022. Among these personalities include:
These are the people who, while have been suggested to run for either president or vice president have personally ruled out the idea of running for either or both positions. Among these personalities include:

For president

Experts have warned against voting for candidates backed by the government of China in the 2022 elections, amidst territorial conflicts between China and the Philippines. Issues on the government's handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, where it was used to broaden a reign of fear and repression, has also been flagged.