The elections definitely haven't been going smoothly. Reports from all over the country flooded social networks and media stations. The most common problem was the very long waiting time to vote. A lot of voters complained that it took them more than 2 hours before they could actually feed their ballot to the PCOS machines. The searing heat of the sun also didn't help the long lines. Another problem that kept on getting reported were incidents of PCOS machine failures. Either the machines didn't read the votes, got jammed, or didn't work at all. Liberal Party standard bearer Sen. Noynoy Aquino experienced this himself as the precinct where he was supposed to vote had a broken PCOS machine.
Comelec extended the voting hours to 7 p.m. but various groups asked them them to extend it beyond that because there were still a lot of people who are still stuck waiting for their turn to vote.
Mic
In the municipality of San Agustin Isabela. The incumbent Mayor assigned the barangay officials to change all the vote against his candidacy in favor of him. Specially to Barangay Mapalad his home town.
Tim Stocks
In your article you wrote above “The most common problem was the very long waiting time to vote. A lot of voters complained that it took them more than 2 hours before they could actually feed their ballot to the PCOS machines.” The time to vote at the barangay on Bohol where I observed my wife and her family voting at took them from 330P.M. to about 1030PM before they got their chance to vote. The barangay her sister voted at took her from 945A.M. to about 330P.M. to vote and her husband had a number that was so far behind hers that he would not stay to vote. The only problem that needs to be resolved now is to get the people in much quicker than this so they can vote and go home.
The officials responsible for the long waiting lines and the very long time to vote did not come up with a very great process. They need to improve this process greatly before the next election. The voting machines process was handled greatly and did not cause the long time to get in and vote. These officials did a big disservice to their workers that worked at the voting places and a even bigger disservice to the voters.
I would like to say that the Filipino people that came out and voted really did represent their character as being very kind, patient, peaceful, caring, and Godly people that care and love their country the Philippines. It was really great to observe this in the Filipino people during this new way of voting during the election. They did their duty. Now it is time for the officials to do their duty and come up with a process to decrease the time it takes to get in and vote. By the way did anyone apologize to the people for the time it took for them to get in and vote?
Tim