By Daisy CL Mandap
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| The House Resolution called the first day of overseas voting in HK 'chaotic' |
Consul General
Raly Tejada has confirmed his online participation today in a House of Representatives
inquiry into the alleged “chaotic and disorganized ” first day of overseas
voting in Hong Kong and several overseas posts.
House Resolution
No 2544 dated Apr 12 was filed by Bayan Muna representatives Ferdinand R.
Gaite, Eufemia C. Cullamat and Carlos Isagani T. Zarate, and published in mainstream
media in Manila on Monday.
In it, the
authors said the Apr 10 opening of overseas voting for Filipinos in many places
was “marred with confusion and met with concerns by overseas Filipino workers.”
It singled out
Hong Kong as the place where thousands of workers were unable to vote on the
first day because of inadequate vote counting machines (VCMs) and precincts,
causing a long queue of voters. Instead of the previous 10 precincts, only five had been set up that day.
Further, the
resolution cited a report from United Filipinos (Migrante) Hong Kong chair
Dolores Balladares Pelaez saying that Congen Tejada had announced that only
3,000 people could cast their votes that day. As a result, only 3,285 were able
to vote, said the motion.
This was
followed by a statement released on Tuesday evening by Bayan Muna HK which
Pelaez also chairs, where it was claimed that voter disenfranchisement
continued in Hong Kong after two VCMs malfunctioned.
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| The police team leader asked CG to stop the queueing at 11:30am on the first day |
In response, a surprised Congen Tejada said, “On the contrary napakaayos natin and organized despite facing some challenges. I really feel for my staff who have been working so hard to ensure that we have a successful election."
“Maging Filipino community sa Hong Kong super
proud ako kasi di lang disiplinado kundi talagang matiisin sila kahit na gaano
kahaba ang pila.” (I am also super proud of the Filipino community in Hong
Kong because they are not only disciplined they have also been patient, even when
the queues were long).
“And it shows in
the record turnout.”
Indeed, given the strict pandemic controls being enforced by the police and the sorely inadequate VCMs commissioned for use in Hong Kong initially, the number of voters on each day has been high compared to recent overseas voting exercises.
For the past
nine days of voting the daily turnout never dipped to below 1,000 and last
Sunday peaked to more than 5,000, despite a queue that extended up to three
kilometres away at one point.
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| A sparse crowd on Tuesday still resulted in a total turnout of nearly 1,300 |
Adding Tuesday’s tally of nearly 1,300 the total turnout so far should be well over 25,000. With three more Sundays to go plus a statutory holiday on May 1, this puts Hong Kong on track to match, if not exceed its 45,000 turnout in the last presidential election in 2016.
This is despite
two of the additional five VCMs put in place starting Tuesday last week becoming
totally unusable by Sunday. The voters assigned to the two affected precincts
were still able to vote, though, even if the waiting time for them became much longer.
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| PINDUTIN PARA SA DETALYE |
Thus, Congen
Tejada said, “Wala namang disenfranchisement
– lahat naman nakaboto. Wala akong narinig kahit isa sa ating Filcom na
nagreklamo. Mostly ay masaya naman.”
(There was no
disenfranchisement at all, everybody got to vote. Not one among our Filcom
members complained. Most of them were happy).
He also reiterated
that the Consulate had always insisted on getting no less than the 10 VCMs that
had always been assigned to Hong Kong previously, especially since the total number of
registered voters had swelled to a record 93,625 for this election.
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| PRESS FOR DETAILS |
However, Comelec
initially determined that five were enough, based on their estimation that one machine could handle
20,000 ballots.
“Never kaming nag request ng lesser number ng
VCMs. Di namin balak pahirapan ang aming mga sarili at Filcom,” he said.
(We never requested for a lesser number of VCMs. We do not wish to make things
difficult for us and for the Filcom).
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| Even the back area of Bayanihan is occupied when there is an overflow from the crowd of voters |
Earlier, Congen said he had already asked Comelec to send more VCMs to Hong Kong to replace those that have conked out, and maybe even have a spare or two on standby.
In her
statement, Pelaez also complained of the Consulate’s recent practice of giving
only ballpark figures for the daily turnout, saying it was not like an exit
poll that could influence voters.
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| PRESS FOR DETAILS |
Pelaez said getting an accurate number each day could give the community a better idea of how many people are likely to have voted at the end of the exercise.
Congen
Tejada did not dispute this, but reiterated that it was Comelec which instructed all overseas posts not to disclose the exact number of people who voted each day.
In the House
resolution, the proponents also dealt with problems reported from places like
Dubai where the first day of election resembled that of Hong Kong. People
queued up for up to five hours to vote, and police reprimanded them for not
keeping social distancing.
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| PRESS FOR DETAILS! |
Relatively small
matters like voters wearing campaign shirts inside the polling place and loud
campaigning from places near precincts were also reported.
In Saudi Arabia,
voters complained about not being given indelible ink on their fingers to
indicate that they had voted while in many countries like Japan, the United
States and Italy, the mailed ballots were all delayed.
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| PINDUTIN PARA SA DETALYE |
Over in Shanghai, no voting could take place because of the citywide lockdown due to Covid, while in France the Philippine Embassy had reportedly shut down, depriving Filipinos living there of their right to vote.
