The Commission on Elections announced on Friday, October 25, 2013 that the Barangay elections will be back to the usual manual process. COMELEC Commissioner Sixto Brillantes confirmed to the media that it’s “all system go” for the national Barangay elections.
The national poll body reminded the voters to go out and vote as early as possible, the polling precincts will be open at 7:00 AM on Monday and will close at exactly 3:00 PM, shorter than the previous general national elections which runs up to 12 hours.
The reasons for the early closure of voting precincts is due the longer hour of counting than the automated elections during the May 2013 general elections. Voters who voted for the last election will be voting in the same precincts.
For the Barangay Elections there will be no shading of ballots, voters have to write preferably the full names of the candidates though first names or surnames alone may still count.
Voters can also make erasures on their ballots unlike the previous automated elections that voters are not allowed to make erasures. For those who make erasure, they should just clearly strike out with a line. There is no need to countersign erasures or the ballot may be declared as stray.
Voting procedures for the Barangay Elections is the same with the previous national elections, only the Boards of Election Tellers (BET), the accredited watchers and the voters are allowed inside the precinct. Cellular phones are allowed inside the voting precinct but taking pictures of filled-up ballots are prohibited.
Voters are required to present a government ID with picture and signature, they should look their names in the list of official voters and once the voter’s identity is verified, the chair of the BET will give the ballot for voting.
After the voting is done, the ballot should be returned to the Board of Election Teller and the BET chairman or the voter can drop the ballot in the ballot box and then the voter will be marked with indelible ink.