Despite some VCM glitches, conduct of elections in Quezon peaceful, says police

Comelec logo and VCM, INQUIRER GRAPHICS

LUCENA CITY––Despite technical glitches in some vote-counting machines, the national and local elections in Quezon province started peacefully on May 9.

“There were no untoward incidents that affected the peaceful conduct of the election in the province,” Colonel Joel Villanueva, Quezon police director, said citing the latest reports from the Provincial Election Monitoring Action Center (Pemac) based in Camp Nakar as of 10:30 a.m.

He added: “We hope that it remains a peaceful election.”

Lawyer Allan Enriquez, Quezon election supervisor, said the province’s two cities and 39 municipalities have 2,443 clustered precincts in 1,126 voting centers.

The province has 1,424,023 registered voters in the 2022 elections.

“There were reports of some VCM malfunctions but they were immediately addressed by poll officials and technicians,” Enriquez said in a phone interview.

He said standby units would replace some of the still-malfunctioning VCMs.

“The voters can still vote by filling up their ballots,” Enriquez said.

He explained that the filled-up ballots would be temporarily placed by poll officials in a box, to be witnessed by party watchers and the accredited citizens’ arms.

Once the counting of votes from the other precincts is finished, the functioning VCMs would be transferred to other precincts with defective machines for the counting of the collected ballots, the Comelec further explained.

Enriquez described the malfunctioning VMCs as “old and antiquated.”

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