By LEYTE-SAMAR DAILY EXPRESS
TACLOBAN CITY.–The special elections supposed to be conducted in a village in Pagsanghan town, Samar province today was reset to June 3.
Samar elections supervisor Corazon Montallana said rescheduling of the special polls in Barangay Buenos Aires, which has a voting population of 492, will give the poll body more time to attend to logistics and and other needs.
“Of course, there is also a need for more security preparations,” Montallana said.
The two teams from the 801st Infantry Brigade earlier deployed and headquartered at Hinabagan town would remain in the area until the holding of the special polls. Members of the local police would be deployed in Buenos Aires on the day of the elections, Montallana added.
Official ballots intended for Buenos Aires were inadvertently delivered to Barangay Generosa, Guimbal town in Iloilo, which is why there was no election May 10.
Montallana said that the resetting of the special elections in Buenos Aires was contained under Comelec en banc Resolution Number 8946, a copy of which was faxed to her only on Friday, the day before the scheduled special election.
The conduct of the elections in Buenos Aires is being closely watched by the contending parties considering that it could determine the eventual winners.
Based on the Comelec records, the two mayoralty candidates, Jim Canones (Nacionalista Party) and Ruben Palma (Lakas-Kampi) are only separated by 186 votes. Palma has so far obtained 2,225 votes against Canones’ 2,039.
Pagsanghan, some 60 kms away from provincial capital of Catbalogan City, is a fifth class town with more than 10,000 inhabitants spread out over 13 villages.
While the precinct count optical scan (PCOS) machines would be used during the special balloting, the votes would be counted manually.