A POLL official called on those who witnessed election-related offenses yesterday to document the violations and report these to authorities.
Cebu Provincial Election Supervisor Marco Lionel Castillano said they did not encounter any election-related violence.
What surfaced in some areas on the days leading to Election Day were complaints about vote-buying, illegal campaign materials and violations of the liquor ban.
Castillano, a lawyer, said that if anyone wants to file a complaint, they should go to the prosecutor’s office and issue an affidavit.
The Commission on Elections (Comelec) received several reports on vote-buying since last Friday up to Sunday.
Castillano said their office is acting on the reports, but he said it will be difficult to issue orders since they don’t have personal knowledge of the complaints.
“It’s difficult because we didn’t witness the incident ourselves. The people should stand by their complaint and testify,” he said.
He cited an incident in Carmen town where a civilian saw a person bringing cash, a stapler and sample ballots that were allegedly used in vote-buying.
The civilian caught the violator through a citizen’s arrest, but refused to execute an affidavit against the person.
On the issue of the voter’s list, Castillano said the poll body already reminded voters to visit the nearest poll office to check their precinct number. Doing so would have spared the voter from any inconvenience on Election Day.
He explained that the problem was due to the change in the number of voters per cluster. When before the maximum number of voters in a cluster was 600, there are now only 400 voters per clustered precinct.
Castillano also advised the public to remain vigilant as they await the results of the election. (Elitz Alia Caballero, CNU Intern)