MANILA, Philippines (3rd update, 8:56 a.m.) — Vice Mayor Joy Belmonte claimed the Quezon City mayoral race, beating her closest rival Quezon City Rep. Bingbong Crisologo.
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The tally of votes as of 7:40 a.m. showed Belmonte of Serbisyo sa Bayan Party getting 468,764 votes against Crisologo’s 365,329 votes. She and running mate, Gian Sotto, were proclaimed winners Monday morning.
Crisologo, who ran under PDP-Laban, was arrested for obstruction of justice on the eve of election day for allegedly attempting to disrupt authorities in a vote-buying incident.
Belmonte, who is on her third term as vice mayor, also defeated other opponents: Romeo Acebedo (2,138 votes), Esmeraldo Balosa (1,128 votes), Alex Lague (828 votes) Ismael Mathay III (19,082 votes), Emma Orozco (3,585 votes), Andoy Rosales (2,128 votes), Teodoro Rusios (553 votes) and Henry Samonte (2,808 votes).
Belmonte is the daughter of former House Speaker Feliciano “Sonny” Belmonte Jr. and late newspaper publisher Betty Go-Belmonte.
Councilor Sotto managed to snag the vice mayoralty post with more than 382,000 votes, enjoying only a narrow margin of about 39,000 votes over second placer Jopet Sison. The son of Senate President Vicente “Tito” Sotto III also beat actor Roderick Paulate, who earned about 112,000 votes.
Gian’s cousin, Vico Sotto, took over Pasig City’s leadership after beating incumbent Mayor Robert “Bobby” Eusebio. — Gaea Katreena Cabico
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Disclosure: Quezon City Mayor-elect Joy Belmonte is a shareholder of Philstar Global Corp., which operates digital news outlet Philstar.com. This article was produced following editorial guidelines.