Don’t forget how Abalos suspended the registration on a date when most people were home (in the provinces) for the (Christmas) holidays. Fishy.

[…] Current: Turning out the vote […]

A contributing factor to the low voter turn out was the prevalence of unopposed candidates in the local level … and it helped tremendously the more deserving senatorial aspirants.

Obviously, when this kind of topic arises, the blame will be thrown to COMELEC. Partly, they were responsible for some irregularities and misdeeds during the last elections but still the whole direction of what COMELEC would have done was the responsibility also of the Legislative branch since they can not act on their own without the law. That is democracy everybody was talking about: deliberation, exchange of ideas the Lower House and the Senate would have done for the modernization of the electoral process. In a high tech world, when people were easily called out to streets through SMS, to oust a corrupt President, I can’t just imagine how in the world the Philippines can not modernize its electoral procedures easily, even after the so-called “Garci scandal” when obviously problems can be solved mostly by using computers. Results will come out fast, votes can not be easily padded, lost of names will be greatly minimized, disqualification procedures vs a candidate will be easily done (so that Alan Cayetano will not be airing always his concerns despite already in the magic 12); these are among other things that can make elections easily be done. Opposition was really out-of-focus (or maybe they have other agenda). Instead of spending time and money on modernizing COMELEC, it took them 2 years to shout out loud to deal with the 2004 elections, not on the purpose of reforming the election process, but to unseat the sitting President. And how hypocrite these people are (Lacson, Escudero, Cayetano, Legarda, Estrada, etc.) that after criticizing the current system of elections, and avoid purposely making laws to reform elections, as advocated by Christian and Solita Monsod, they themselves would subject to it and, right there, benefit through the process, while the others, especially the local positions, would be cheated right in front of their faces. People are actually fed up on these things. Maybe they don’t have anymore “choices” the reason they did not come out to exercise their right for suffrage. And this is really bad.

[…] In Inquirer Current, John Nery is puzzled by conflicting estimates of voter turnout. […]

John,
I think the simplest explanation is this: no one will know PRECISELY how many voters cast ballots until ALL the ERs have been totalled up. You would think that Comelec, Namfrel, or any of the other holders of the SEVEN copies of the Precinct Election Returns would already have done so.

But that would require:
(1) having a copy of all 224,748 ERs; (2) reading each one for the handwritten number of VALID BALLOTS canvassed by the BEI; (3) adding them all up and dividing by 44.9 million officially registered voters in the CVL yields the exact turnout of the 2007 elections.

To get an idea of the amount of manual labor needed to get the turnout precisely, given that one has a complete set of all 224,748 ERs, consider that there are only 24×60 or 1440 minutes per day. Assume a reasonable number that could be processed per minute and you end up with an estimate of days to weeks, depending on throughput.

This late–3 weeks after Election Day–no one yet knows this percentage with precision, I bet!

Such is a reality of the manual election.

Oh, by the way, I estimate the pile of 224,748 ER’s to be 22.5 meters tall, if stacked neatly and assuming each ER is a single page.

This just proves that COMELEC under it’s Chairman Abalos is inconsistent, unreliable and never to be trusted.

In the USA, it is readily known how many voted and under what category, white, black, men, women, republican, democrats, or/and liberal or independent. Voter’s name is listed in a folder, the same folder, election after election, to sign his/her name. These folders are grouped on separate tables according to the first letter of voters’ name, wherein a voter signs beneath his signature of the last election. Then she/he waits till the voter inside the booth finishes and leaves the booth. This person while inside the booth after pushing each little knob under each candidate’s name, will turn a big knob to his left, thus resetting the slots open once more for the next voter. At the same time he pushes that bar toward his left, the curtain opens. It seems the cast votes automatically are recorded and categorized to programmed setting, which will then be available to reporters, candidates and interested organizations.

The ineptness and ignorance is appalling in the Philippines. Those in the position of power should, by now, be knowledgeable of the ways of how elections are conducted in developed and progressive democracies in the world. The likes of Abalos should have probably been sent abroad to observe how Americans do their election, or they can gather information from resources like invited experts on election from the United States or watch a video of how these elections are held. Anyway, the Philippines’ democracy is copied after the USA, all they have to do is simply copy right and smartly. They can and should even be able to do their election better in the Philippines, based on the intention of the Constitution and that is to strengthen the power of the people to govern themselves. They are not starting from zero, they have models to follow.

Anyway…let’s not forget that whatever we do now cannot be kept secret…because of the internet and the vigilance of those who are learning to use it for information. The best thing that can happen to lessen secretive dealings by government bureaucrats and officials is to pass a bill computerizing all government transactions.

Computerized election, my eye. In the recent manual elections the last four years proliferates the election operators of the Garci type that resulted to questionable election results. That was because the Garci types could be found everywhere, from the precinct level to the commisioner level, and they did their job well, sometimes not well, example-in Maguindanao. By computerizing the election, is there a guarantee that the Garci type will not include the Garci Computer Whiz Kid? Just asking.