It was Thursday morning when Ian Agatep went to the Ateneo Commission on Elections (Comelec) voting station. “I was surprised to see that I had three opponents instead of just one,” said Ian Agatep, who was then running for second year SOM Central Board Representative.
“[We found out] that Gio Alejo was omitted in the ballots. Some candidates’ names were misspelled and there were also mistakes in the positions,” said Comelec Chief Commissioner Jessica Lazaro in an interview with The GUIDON.
Comical as it may sound, this is anything but funny in the context of the Sanggunian general elections. This is just one of the many blunders Comelec committed before and during the elections.
As the one and only institution in charge of the elections, more is to be expected from Comelec. From the beginning, Comelec has been very strict with the candidates in terms of deadlines for the submission of requirements, approval of campaign materials, among others. The commissioners weren’t hesitant about giving out sanctions to candidates. It follows thus that when it came to ensuring that the ballots were correct and printed on time, the Comelec would also exercise utmost care and discretion.
Aside from the misprinting of ballots, another Comelec blunder was incoming SOSE second year Central Board Rep Gio Alejo’s omission from the ballots. To remedy this, Comelec’s initial plan was to “simply subtract the [number of SOSE votes] from [Gio Alejo’s] quota.”
The next day however, the move was discovered to be unconstitutional. SOSE and SOM freshman ballots were later declared to be null and void. Comelec’s course of action was to “contact the students who voted prior to the changes and [ask] them to vote again.”
Although quota was reached Friday evening, thus preventing a failure of elections, we also cannot help but question what constitutes a successful election. The Miting de Avance for both the School and Central Board were well-organized and were well attended, at least by the respective candidates’ supporters. However, that is not enough.
Late Friday afternoon, candidates and Comelec commissioners conducted a “caf raid” to encourage students to vote. At that point, over 1,000 votes were still needed to reach quota. Later that day during the InTACT plenary, candidates and Comelec commissioners were again “encouraging” freshmen to vote. One of the top four candidates was the frontliner in leading freshmen to the voting station.
We understand the need for Comelec and the candidates to help each other in making sure that the quota is reached but a line has to be drawn somewhere. There is something inappropriate about candidates walking around campus with Comelec posters hanging around their necks. To reach quota, Comelec and the candidates went table to table, bench to bench, barkada to barkada, just to encourage people to vote. And we thought the campaign period was over then.
Does the end justify the means? What good is reaching quota if the voters did not go to the voting stations out of their own volition? The mistakes of this year’s general elections ought to be enough for Comelec and Sanggu to know what should and should not be done. The next elections will be the one for freshmen in July.
We will expect more.
