The Philippine Online Chronicles

The Liberal Party (LP) dominated the Quezon City local elections, a partial and unofficial count by GMA-7 showed today.

Incumbent vice-mayor Herbert Bautista has been shown leading the mayoralty race with nearly 500,000 votes while running-mate and second-generation politician Joy Belmonte leads the vice-mayoralty race with 496,000 votes.

Bautista's nearest rival Mike Defensor of the People's Reform Party (PRP) managed to get only 125 thousand votes while running-mate Aiko Melendez got 120,000.

In the first congressional district, incumbent congressman Bingbong Crisologo of the Nacionalista Party bested independent candidate Vivienne Tan by 50,000 votes while LP's Bolet Banal holds a slim lead in the third congressional district with 37,000 votes over his nearest rivals, incumbent congressman Matias Defensor of PRP (30,000) and former basketball coach Franz Pumaren of the Nationalist People's Coalition (27,000).

In the fourth congressional district, incumbent Mayor Sonny Belmonte of LP got nearly 100,000 votes—more than 70,000 votes ahead of Don De Castro of Lakas-Kampi.

In the giant second congressional district, LP bet Councilor Winnie Castelo leads by 25,000 votes against independent candidate Kit Belmonte, 128,000 to 103,000.

GMA-7 's partial and unofficial tally was released at 4 p.m. today covering 85 percent of the precincts in Quezon City. According to reports on DZMM, the local Commission on Elections is set to declare Bautista and Joy Belmonte as winners.

Quezon City is the biggest city in the National Capital Region in terms of land area and population.