Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas. Photo from PPCRV Facebook page
MANILA, Philippines — Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas on Thursday thanked volunteers of a poll watchdog for their sacrifices and “heroic” deed in the 2022 elections.
Volunteers of the Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting (PPCRV) assisted in the encoding of physical copies of election returns printed by vote-counting machines from various precincts nationwide. They work in shifts for more than an hour at the 24/7 PPCRV command center in the University of Santo Tomas (UST) Quadricentennial Pavilion in Manila.
“Hindi namin kayo pwedeng bayaran. Hindi namin kayo kayang bayaran because only God can pay you and God knows your sacrifices,” said Villegas, who visited and observed the PPCRV’s unofficial parallel counting of votes cast in the May 9 polls.
(We cannot pay you. We cannot pay you because only God can pay you and God knows your sacrifices.)
“They’re so young and they’re so heroic and they’re so generous and I’m really touched and inspired,” he added.
The PPCRV’s manual encoding of votes was meant to validate the numbers electronically transmitted through the transparency server of the Commission on Elections.
The poll watchdog will operate until May 20 at the UST Quadricentennial Pavilion.
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