THE official campaign period for the May 2025 elections, at least as it concerns national positions, began Tuesday. This means that candidates could start actively asking their constituents to vote for them.
Everyone knows, however, that candidates have been working to make themselves known and remembered by the public long before Feb.11.
For months and weeks before the start of the campaign period, the public has been treated to billboards, posters, media appearances and mentions, social media posts, activities in the guise of public service, among others, featuring the candidates’ names and faces.
Such brazen activity, done before campaigning should technically begin, could be easily interpreted by any person on the street as premature campaigning, defined in simple terms as electioneering prior to the period when campaigning is allowed. Premature campaigning is considered an election offense, prohibited under Section 80 the Omnibus Election Code of the Philippines.
According to the law, “election campaign or partisan political activity outside campaign period. – It shall be unlawful for any person, whether or not a voter or candidate, or for any party, or association of persons, to engage in an election campaign or partisan political activity except during the campaign period: Provided, That political parties may hold political conventions or meetings to nominate their official candidates within thirty days before the commencement of the campaign period and forty-five days for Presidential and Vice-Presidential election.”
Surprise, surprise. The flurry of premature activities we saw before Tuesday was not in violation of the law.
Jurisprudence is on their side. A 2009 Supreme Court decision, Penera versus COMELEC and Andanar, said a candidate is only liable for election offenses committed during the official campaign period. Before the campaign period, a person who has filed a certificate of candidacy is not yet a candidate — hence cannot possibly commit an election offense.
What refuge this must give to numerous candidates and groups who went out of their way – and their budgets – to boost their stock in the days before Tuesday. Imagine technically not being in breach of the law while doing the exact opposite of what it intends! The brazen ones were the first to do so, of course, but the others, who must have initially faced the dilemma of following suit or playing fair, must have realized that inaction would simply doom their candidacies.
All that seems pointless now, because the national campaign has started and the only violations that candidates must be careful to avoid have to do with the location and size of their materials. The Comelec’s Operation Baklas seeks to dismantle campaign paraphernalia that are outside of designated common poster areas, or are bigger than the dimensions specified – 2×3 feet.
On the contrary, not so pointless. It is an unfortunate fact that while some things may be legal, they may not be right.
If we could take a moment to remember those who brazenly and shamelessly exploited the legal loophole to gain an undue advantage in terms of the people’s memory and regard, then perhaps it could serve as an insight, a clue if you will, on the would-be public servant’s nature, tendencies, and integrity.