BUTUAN CITY – Minor glitches struck an otherwise smooth conduct of election in some areas in Northeastern Mindanao (Caraga) and Northern Mindanao (Reg 10) as some vote-counting machines (VCMs) malfunctioned in the early hours of the election.
Close to 40 VCMs malfunctioned due to paper jam while some rejected the ballots that were being fed into them.
“May mga nag malfunction but (our) contingency measure was (to) let the voting continue. Then later at the arrival of new VCM or repaired VCM batch feeding was made,” said Northern Mindanao Commission on Election Regional Director Atty. Francisco Pobe, in a phone interview with The Manila Bulletin on Monday afternoon.
The Northern Mindanao Comelec official said the incidents were manageable, assuring that the flow of voting was orderly.
Director Pobe also noted the long line of voters waiting for their turn.
“But only long lines are noted due to pandemic new normal and protocol enforcement,” said Director Pobe.
Meanwhile, two Black Hawk Helicopters from the Tactical Operations Group (TOG) were utilized in transporting 12 newly-repaired VCMs to the Province of Dinagat Islands (PDI), Surigao City and Agusan del Sur.
The said VCMs were escorted by the Comelec personnel from the Technical Repair Hub.
As of press time, there was no untoward incident in the different areas in Northeastern and Northern Mindanao regions, the regional Media Action Center (MAC) said.
“Generally peaceful as of this time,” said Police Regional Office 13 (PRO 13) Public Information Office (PIO) P/Maj. Dorothy M. Tumulak said.