COMELEC to 547,681 Voters: Cast your votes early

About half million people will troop to different public schools in Cebu City as early as 6 o’clock in the morning today (May 13) to cast their votes in today’s automated local and national elections hoping that their favorite candidates will win.

There are 47 candidates who are vying for the 20 elective positions in Cebu City for mayor, vice mayor, congressmen that will represent the north and south districts in Congress and 16 seats for councilors of thetwo districts.

Many people were surprised to learn that there are seven candidates who are running for congressman of the city’s north district, although only two of them are considered popular – former congressman Raul V. Del Mar of Liberal Party (LP) and talent manager Annabelle Rama of the United National Alliance (UNA).

North District incumbent representative Rachel “Cutie” Del Mar has decided not to seek reelection because she wants to give her father the chance to be the one to continue her projects if elected.

Acting Cebu City Election Officer Ferdinand Gujilde had requested the 547,681 registered voters in the city’s 80 barangays to vote early rather than to wait until the afternoon.

Unlike the previous elections that the voting time is only until 3 o’clock in the afternoon, today’s election allows the voters to vote until 7 p.m. but Gujilde said “Dili g’yud maayo nga magdugay-dugay pagbotar abi kay gilugwayan sa Comelec ang oras sa pagbotar.”

South district consist of 34 barangays, but it has 299,389 voters which is much higher compared to only 248,292 voters in the 46 barangays of the north district.

There are 3,117 original precincts in the entire 80 barangays of the city, but the Comelec clustered the precinct to only 592 precincts because the Precinct Count Optical Scan (PCOS) machine is capable of scanning and count the votes of at least 1,000 voters and it can transmit the result directly to the city canvassing center.

The city canvassing center is to be manned by the Board of Election Canvassers (BEC) composed of the Election Officer as chairman, City Prosecutor and the City Treasurers as members.

If the Board of Election Inspectors in the precincts may not be able to send the results of the elections, the BEC chairman will call the BEI chairman through their mobile phones of what causes the delay.

Every five PCOS machines the Comelec has assigned a technician to quickly respond to in case of technical problems.