By VERA Files
CANDIDATES in Monday’s midterm elections have been using “Mother’s Day” and birthday celebrations, among others, as cover to buy votes, a political think tank said Sunday.
A statement issued by Center for People Empowerment in Governance (CenPEG) on election eve said election cheating has worsened and poll automation “is powerless against it.”
CenPEG identified Camarines Sur as one area where politicians have resorted to “Mother’s Day” and “birthday” as occasions to herd voters for meals, drinking, and money inside hotels, beach resorts, and even schools.
In Palawan and other provinces, vote buying and “partying” take place at cockpits, it said.
Bobby M. Tuazon, CenPEG Director for Policy Studies, quoted reports reaching the think tank as saying that vote buying has become “massive, bolder, and openly brazen with voters themselves lining up publicly to receive envelopes containing money in the guise of poll watch fees.”
