On the lawless island of Basilan, the Philippines' kidnap capital, gangs yesterday went from house to house buying votes with crisp 500-peso (US$9) notes, residents said.
Witnesses said enforcers for politicians on the island, a stronghold of the al-Qaeda-linked Abu Sayyaf group, woke up people and knocked on storefronts to hand out sample ballots with cash attached.
At the main polling station in the capital Lamitan, an elementary school, "poll-watchers" could be seen handing out white envelopes to voters.
"They were at it since early this morning, offering as much as 500 pesos per registered voter," said Rolando Lim, whose family owns a store just meters away from a polling booth.
Lim said he refused the cash and declined to name the candidates offering money.
"They may get back at me, that's how it works round here," he said.
Basilan's volcanic terrain and thick jungles have for years provided a stage for bandits and the Abu Sayyaf, a Muslim militant group known for kidnapping foreigners and carrying out deadly bombings.
The 166,360 registered voters on the island in the extreme south of the Philippines, some 900km from Manila, voted yesterday for a president, vice president, lawmakers and local officials.
But nobody was paying much attention to the presidential rivalry of incumbent Gloria Arroyo and film star Fernando Poe.
The contest here is between Governor Wahab Akbar, a former Islamic militant, and challenger Jim Hamatam.
Both have private armies and a heated exchange nearly boiled over into a Wild West-style street gunfight at a recent rally.
Soldiers toting assault rifles patrolled Lamitan yesterday in a truck armed with heavy M-60 machine gun, but despite security paid "poll-watchers" could be seen watching voting very closely.
The local government also said it had received reports that armed men were intimidating voters in surrounding villages.
"We have received such reports and we are checking them now. But everything seems to be normal in the first hour of voting," provincial government spokesman Cris Puno told reporters.
"The election here this year is more volatile," said Romeo Antonio Alfaro, a local election official in Lamitan, a mix of Christians and Muslims.
Residents blame the tension on the gubernatorial candidates and the proliferation of unlicensed firearms.
"Owning guns is a way of life here," said Elsan Tindic, a Muslim who heads a local non-government organization. "The more guns they have, the more they feel secure."
Governor Akbar was a former Muslim militant linked to the Abu Sayyaf, while Basilan Congressman Jerry Salapuddin was a former commander of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF), a Muslim separatist group.
Puno said Akbar was running for his third and final term as governor, and for the first time faced a challenger with a private army equal to his.
"They tried shooting Akbar during a rally this week," Puno said. "I don't know what will happen today, but I hope it is going to pass safely."
The Commission on Elections has placed the entire island under its direct control, dispatching extra troops to prevent an escalation of violence.
RSS