A cliffhanger race to lead the Philippines began Tuesday with emotion-charged rallies by a dead movie star's adopted daughter, a politician who brags about killing criminals and other top contenders.

The three-month election campaign got under way with four aspirants standing a genuine chance of succeeding popular President Benigno Aquino, who is limited by the constitution to a single term.

A Philippine town mayor was shot and wounded in an ambush in the conflict-wracked south on Sunday, two days before the official campaign for general elections in May kick off, police said.

A gunman riding a motorcycle opened fire on Mayor Jasper Que as he drove with his two bodyguards in the port city of Zamboanga at around 9 am, city police spokeswoman Senior Inspector Helen Galvez told AFP.

The Philippines' raucous democracy cranks into top gear this week as campaigning begins for national elections, with familiar themes of corruption, dictatorship and celebrity star-power to dominate.

The three-month campaign launches Tuesday with most interest on a crowded contest to succeed President Benigno Aquino, who has won global applause for six years of strong economic growth and a bruising anti-graft campaign.

The Philippines is set to offer the U.S. military use of eight bases, a military spokesman said Wednesday, after the country's supreme court upheld a security agreement with Washington forged in the face of rising tensions with China.

The facilities include the former U.S. Clark airbase and air and naval facilities on the southwestern island of Palawan which faces the South China Sea, the focus of territorial disputes with China.

Stray bullets and exploding firecrackers have killed two and injured hundreds in the Philippines, authorities said Friday, amid the country’s traditional riotous New Year celebrations.

A drunk man died after he embraced a giant firecracker, called "Goodbye Philippines", as it was about to explode, health secretary Janet Garin told reporters.

Two soldiers were killed in a pre-dawn attack by Islamic extremists in the conflict-racked southern Philippines on Monday, a local military spokesman said.

Abu Sayyaf guerrillas fired at a military detachment in the jungles near Talipao town on Jolo island, sparking a 15-minute gunbattle that also left another soldier wounded, said Major Filemon Tan.

Muslim guerrillas killed 10 civilians in the majority Catholic Philippines over Christmas, the military said Sunday, with some Christians in the affected areas now too scared to sleep in their homes.

Guerillas from the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) captured nine farmers and shot them dead on December 24 in the southern island of Mindanao, said Colonel Ricky Bunayog, commander of the local battalion.

Seven Christian farmers were killed on Thursday as Muslim guerrillas launched a series of attacks in the troubled southern Philippines, the military said.

The fighters of the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (BIFF) seized the seven and then killed them in a series of raids in the island of Mindanao where Christian-Muslim conflicts have seethed for decades.

Heavy rains pummeled the entire Philippines on Saturday, flooding more areas as the government declared a "state of national calamity".

The death toll after a week of devastating weather has risen to 41, according to confirmed reports from national and local disaster monitoring agencies.

Tens of thousands of people struggled Friday through waist-deep floods in typhoon-battered farmlands near the Philippine capital, as yet another storm threatened to dump more rain.

Large parts of four farming provinces on the main northern island of Luzon have been submerged in water since Wednesday due to Typhoon Melor, which left at least 27 people dead in its wake.