By Daisy CL Mandap
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| Far shorter queue inside Bayanihan on Tuesday (photo from CG's FB page) |
Five additional precincts with a corresponding number of vote counting machines made all the difference on the third day of overseas voting for the Philippines’ next president, vice-president, 12 new senators and partylist representatives.
According
to Consul General Raly Tejada, a total of 1,762
votes were cast for the day, and the counting was made a lot easier by the
additional VCMs that were put in place only starting Tuesday.
"Magaang na di hamak” (It was far easier), said Congen when asked how the additional machines had helped make administering the vote easier.
Until he got permission from
the Commission on Elections late on Monday to restore the ten precincts that had
been assigned to Hong Kong in all previous overseas voting exercises, the
Consulate had to make do with just five VCMs in five
precincts.
This led to a potentially explosive
situation Sunday, the first day of overseas voting, when thousands of Filipinos
descended on Bayanihan Centre in Kennedy Town where the month-long vote is
being held.
Because voters could not be processed
quickly, a huge queue formed outside the polling centre, prompting police who
were enforcing strict gathering rules outside to ask the Consulate to stop
people from lining up less than four hours since voting began at 8am.
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Despite this, voters still had to wait
for up to six hours from the time they queued up to get to their designated
precincts.
Things improved on Monday as a
comparatively smaller number showed up to vote, but some also faced delay as
the VCM in their precinct had to be recalibrated and the ballot box changed after
reaching the threshold of 1,000 voters per cycle.
Tejada said that on Tuesday, no significant event happened “except the
blistering pace of voting.”
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Some of those who chose to cast their ballots on this day testified to
how quickly and smoothly the voting went.
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| A steady stream of voters led to the high weekday turnout |
Lizzie Cuyugan, a permanent resident said, “Very good experience today! Our
family of four entered Bayanihan at 1:45pm, and we were out before 2.”
Cuyugan extended thanks to a volunteer from the University of the
Philippines Alumni Association in Hong Kong who assisted her family in finding their
assigned precincts.
The volunteer said among the day's voters were some of the foreign domestic workers who failed to
make it to the cut-off on Sunday. They managed to get permission from their employers
to return Tuesday, and were happy to vote with less queuing.
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