EDITORIAL - Delayed preparations

Once again, millions of Filipinos across the archipelago will troop to polling places for the barangay election. Today's electoral exercises will be the second this year, after the general elections in May that catapulted the son of a former president to the highest post in the land.

But the barangay polls, which will be synchronized with the Sangguniang Kabataan election, will not be as modern as one held in May. The Commission on Elections had decided to revert the voting to manual process after it opted not to renew the contract with Smartmatic, a Venezuelan company which piloted the country's first automated election.

However, in today's process, we can only expect things to be a little chaotic inside the polling precinct. Chaotic in the sense that everything is done manually: From voting to counting of votes.

But that is the least of our concern. Elections in this country are always chaotic ever since Filipinos earned the right of suffrage.

What brings the public to be concerned about today's elections is that there has been a delay in the Comelec preparations. As of yesterday afternoon, many election paraphernalia have yet to arrive to their destinations.

In Cebu, for example, many election personnel from different areas across the province left the Capitol the other night empty-handed. They had been waiting for their election materials for hours but had to leave after being told of the delayed arrival of the paraphernalia.

This leads us to conclude that the Comelec has been unprepared for today's election. After tasting success in the first automated election, poll officials seem to have forgotten the fact that they are going to return to the long and complex process surrounding the manual voting.

Cebu Comelec officer Lionel Marco Castillano had assured that all election paraphernalia will already be at polling precincts before 7: a.m. today. But in spite of his assurance, he cannot deny the fact that the delay will surely affect the conduct of today's polls.