The Diocesan Electoral Board thanked its partner government agencies and non-government groups for a successful collaboration in the conduct of an honest, peaceful and orderly automated election on May 10.

At a thanksgiving Holy Mass with Dumaguete Bishop John Du as main celebrant and con-celebrated by DEB convenor Fr. Julius Heruela, officials and representatives from the Philippine Army headed by Col. Manuel Ochotorena, commander of the 302nd Infantry Brigade, the Philippine National Police, the Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting, the Philippine Information Agency and some media practitioners were present.

In his homily, Du said he was thankful for the coordination among the government and private sectors to ensure that the first-ever automated polls in Negros Oriental would not be marred by violence, threat, harassments, fraud and other forms of illicit activities.

He expressed hopes that the collaboration will be improved and continue in future elections.

Despite minor concerns, the DEB gave a passing mark to all stakeholders for their efforts in making the automated voting in the province relatively successful, Heruela said.

Among the hitches and concerns noted by the DEB/PPCRV were the seemingly inadequate preparation of the Board of Election Inspectors to accommodate voters at the polling precincts and their being unaware of the PPCRV’s mandate to receive a copy of the election returns, missing names from voters’ lists, the supposedly unauthorized assistance of poll watchers to voters in feeding the ballots into the automated voting machines, and rampant vote-buying by candidates before and during election day.

DEB volunteers had intercepted peso bills of different denominations stapled to campaign flyers being openly distributed at some polling places, he said.

Heruela said the vote-buying was a desperate move of some politicians to seal their victory.

Overall, Heruela said, the collaboration of stakeholders in Negros Oriental for a peaceful conduct of the presidential polls was a success.

The PPCRV will submit its final report with proper recommendations to its national head office to help improve the country’s automated election system in future polling, Heruela added.*JFP

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