Yesterday's hotly debated national elections in the Philippines have been marked with voter selfies, featuring “balut”, or duck embryo eggs.
It all started with two Filipino celebrities, Daniel Padilla and Kathryn Bernardo, who caused outrage by posting selfies with their voting ballots for the presidential election on social media.
The Commission on Election's (COMELEC) rules and regulations state taking a photo with your answered ballot is strictly prohibited, even investigating nine cases among overseas voters.
The 2016 National And Local Elections Guidelines to Voting states, "Bawal din litratuhan ang balotang namarkahan na ng boto mo." (Taking photos of your marked ballot is prohibited.)
Anyone found in violation of these rules can face a hefty penalty of ONE TO SIX YEARS in prison.
However, COMELEC ruled against any wrongdoing by these celebrities. So people thought of following in their footsteps.
In a way of exercising their democratic right of self expression, voters started posting selfies with balots (duck embryo eggs) to show that they, too, could publish photos of themselves with their "balot".
"Selfie with my balot" plays off the similarities in the spelling of balot/balut and ballots, meaning no one can be penalised for taking a photo with their duck embryo egg.
Yes, COMELEC, look at all these lawbreakers!
"I think those celebrities who took pictures with the ballot, specifically Daniel Padilla and Kathryn Bernardo, did not do any offense because they didn't take it themselves and the ballot was not even shaded," Alex Almencion told BuzzFeed.
"I came across the news of KathNiel having them and their ballots pictured. The fuss about it being illegal to post pictures of ballots as a rule by COMELEC made the news viral. And with that, I just thought "hey, 'ballot' sounds and closely spells like 'balot'." And so I took an egg from our ref and posted a selfie with it," Maggie Bitera told BuzzFeed.
It's an act of rebellion!
Someone even managed to look cool while doing it.
Look, this one is really into balot-buying.
"Sorry COMELEC, I did not know."
Here's a PSA reminding everyone to shade within the circle.
Literally, shade that balot.
Ain't democracy great?
