CHANGE has come. This is to borrow the campaign slogan of President Rodrigo Duterte when he ran in the 2016 presidential polls and won. The same is true with the result of the May 13 elections in the big cities of Cebu, Mandaue and Lapu-Lapu where incumbent chief executives were replaced.
Cebu City Vice Mayor Edgardo C. Labella unseated Mayor Tomas Osmeña who, through his Facebook account, graciously conceded defeat on the night of the canvassing. While Mayor Osmeña was leading the survey during the campaign, in the homestretch Labella got the lead after President Duterte personally endorsed him to the Cebuano voters.
In Lapu-Lapu City, most people were awed that Pajo Barangay Captain Ahong Chan defeated the returning former Mayor Boy Radaza, whose family had been in control of the local politics for decades. Chan ran for mayor in the 2016 polls, but failed to make it against Mayor Paz Radaza, who is now the elected representative of the city’s lone congressional district.
Rep. Jonas Cortes and his team handily won over re-electionist Mayor Luigi Quisumbing and his party. Cortes got the upper hand when weeks prior to the May 13 polls he was endorsed by no less than the grandfather of Mayor Luigi and few days before election day, President Duterte signed into law the bill that Cortes authored, creating Mandaue City as a lone congressional district.
But last Monday’s elections were not without problems that marred what was considered a peaceful and orderly polls. These were practically the same hitches that happened in the 2016 presidential polls. Three years have passed after the 2016 elections, but it seems the Commission on Elections (Comelec) has done less to provide solutions to problems that happen every elections.
SunStar Cebu reported that the malfunction of the voter registration verification machines (VRVMs) and the brownout in the towns of northern Cebu marred the midterm elections. It’s not only the VRVMs that malfunctioned, but also the vote counting machines (VCMs) in some precincts. The power outage in the towns of northern Cebu reminds me of the time when the election results were still counted manually and that when the lights were out the ballot boxes were allegedly substituted.
It’s good that in the precinct in Mandaue City where my wife and I cast our votes, the Board of Election Inspectors (BEI) did not use the VRVMs. Manually using the voters’ list in looking for our names was even faster than the VRVMs. I’m not being malicious, only suspicious, but the defective VRVMs and VCMs were reported in the polling place of former vice president Jejomar Binay and re-electionist Sen. Grace Poe.
The long power outage in the northern towns of Cebu and the malfunction of the VCMs put doubts on the result of the polls. I was intrigued by the statements of former Bogo city Mayor Junie Martinez, who ran for Congress in the fourth district, during an interview by Jason Monteclar at DyCM-Cebu (1152AM) when he said that a group of men from Manila offered him P10 million if he wants to win the elections.
According to Martinez, he already gave all the information to the team of lawyers of their party in Capitol for them to study and take legal action on what happened in the fourth congressional District. He said he is willing to testify if the Magpale-Davide team would take action.
Martinez was surprised by the long brownout on election day and the malfunctioning of the VCMs. To recall, the officials of the power companies in Manila promised that there will be no power outage on election day. Unfortunately, the power operators in Cebu did not make the same pledge as their Manila counterparts.
Martinez thought that after all these years the Comelec had already perfected, if not made the electoral system foolproof. He is asking Congress to pass laws that would correct these problems that only tarnish or cast doubts on the result of the supposedly peaceful and orderly polls.
The result of this elections that most, if not all of the candidates that President Duterte endorsed won is an affirmation of his governance despite international criticism with how he implemented his war against the illegal drug lords. Congratulations to all the winners!