Manila: The son and namesake of the late Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos has narrowly lost the election for vice president, according to an official count that was only completed Friday, almost three weeks after polls closed.
The result dealt a blow to the political aspirations of the family, which had targeted the position for Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jnr as a potential stepping stone to recapturing his late father's presidential post.
Anti-crime firebrand Rodrigo Duterte won the separate May 9 contest for president by landslide, but the closely fought vice presidential race went down the wire, with Marcos losing by 263,473 votes to political neophyte Leni Robredo.
"The elections have been very divisive and we need to rebuild as a nation. He (Duterte) needs everyone's help in rebuilding our country," Robredo said over GMA television as the country's Congress completed the tallying of election returns.
Marcos, 58, did not immediately return telephone calls made by AFP on Friday.
But his lawyer George Garcia told AFP his client was considering filing an appeal, alleging 3.9 million votes for Marcos were not reflected in the official count.
"We suspect that these votes were credited to other candidates.... We believe these votes belong to Bongbong Marcos," Garcia added.
President and vice president of the Philippines are both directly elected positions.
A win for the younger Marcos would have been the family's biggest political victory since its humiliating downfall in 1986 after a "People Power" uprising ended 20 years of the family's rule.
The Marcos family fled to US exile 30 years ago after the revolution ended the dictator's one-man rule, in which thousands of critics were thrown in prison and $10 billion was allegedly plundered from state coffers.
The patriarch died in exile in Hawaii in 1989, but no member of the Marcos family has been convicted.
The Marcoses have since made a surprising political comeback, rebuilding their base in the dictator's northern bailiwick of Ilocos Norte province.
The dictator's widow, Imelda Marcos, this month swept to a third term in the House of Representatives representing Ilocos Norte.
Her daughter, Imee Marcos, was also elected as provincial governor there for the third time.
Marcos Jnr was elected to the Senate in 2010 and his term runs out on June 30.
Robredo, 52, was thrust into politics after the 2012 plane crash death of her husband, the interior minister of incumbent President Benigno Aquino.
She served a three-year term in the House of Representatives before running for vice president under Aquino's party.
She and Duterte are to serve single six-year terms from June 30.
The numbers
Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte of Davao City, of the Philippine Democratic Party’s-People’s Power (PDP-Laban) won the presidential election with 16,601,997 votes while Congresswoman Leni Robredo of the ruling Liberal Party won the vice presidential race with 14,418,817 votes, said Congress.
Former Interior Secretary Manuel "Mar" Roxas II, of the ruling LP, got 9,978,175 votes and ranked second to Duterte, said Congress whose members sat as National Board of Canvassers for several days.
Robredo won with 263,473 votes than Sen. Ferdinand Marcos who got 14,155,344 votes, said Sen. Aquilino Pimentel, president of PDP-Laban and chair of the Senate canvassing committee.
“The joint session (of the upper and lower houses of Congress) has issued the resolution of proclamation of the winners,” said Pimentel, adding that winners will be proclaimed on May 30.
Results of the elections reflected the unofficial counting of ballots done earlier by the Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting, analysts said.
Birthday gift
"This is symbolic because the canvassing of ballots ended on the birthday of Jesse. I think everything that happened (to me) after his death was providential,” said Robredo, who referred to her husband, former interior secretary Jesse Robredo who died in a plane crash in 2012.
“I never thought that the counting of votes would end on his birthday,” Robredo said, adding, “I feel that my husband has been watching over me.”
Meanwhile, Marcos vowed to file electoral protest before Congress, adding that he lost almost four million votes.
“About 3.9 million votes for Marcos were lost in favour of other candidates,” said his lawyer George Garcia, but did not give details.
“We expected this. But there is no truth to allegations that cheating happened,” said Robredo.
Exit polls showed a tight fight between Robredo and Marcos. One pollster said that Marcos would win, while another pollster predicted otherwise.
Marcos complained earlier that he started to lose votes at midnight of May 9, when Smartmatic, the company that provided the system for the automated polls, changed a transparency server of to allegedly correct a computer glitch.
Outgoing President Benigno Aquino campaigned hard against the election of Marcos as vice president.
Aquino had accused Marcos for not asking for forgiveness for the alleged plunder and human rights violations committed by former president Ferdinand Marcos – the former strongmen established a Martial law Rule in 1972 and reigned from 1965 until his ouster by a people-backed military mutiny in 1986.
At the time, Mrs. Corazon Aquino was propped up to the presidency.
