Philippines police, Comelec painting rosy picture of polls - Bayan Gabriela condemns AFP and PNP harassment, disenfranchisement of voters A new type of disenfranchisement in Nueva Ecija Soldiers accost, harass…
MARAWI CITY ? Delegates and participants of the People’s International Observers’ Mission (IOM) witnessed wanton cheating, confusion, and near chaos in today’s election in this city.
Vote-buying and coaching of voters inside election precincts were most rampant. IOM delegates saw poll watchers sitting beside voters and dictated candidates’ names to be written on the ballots.
MANILA — The International Observer Mission-Nueva Ecija team saw today how militarization in Barangay Yuson and Manggang Marikit, Guimba, Nueva Ecija has resulted in a new type of disenfranchisement of voters.
Military overstepped their authority, Peoples’ IOM delegates say
MANILA — Soldiers from the 78th Infantry Battalion of the Philippine Army twice stopped and harassed delegates of the Peoples’ International Observers Mission (Peoples’ IOM) at a checkpoint in the northwestern coast of Cebu this afternoon.
The Peoples’ IOM team in Cebu included foreign observers Elizabeth Hendrickson from the English Lutheran Church in the United States and Minerva Gutierrez, a member of the political party Quebec Solidaire in Canada.
(more…)
MANILA — The umbrella group Bagong Alyansang Makabayan today scored the Commission on Elections and the Philippine National Police for its ?seeming disregard of the reality of rampant fraud and violence marring the 2007 elections.?
?The PNP and the Comelec continue to paint a rosy picture of the elections. There is hardly any recognition of the gravity of the problems of violence, disenfranchisement, vote-buying and outright vote manipulation. How can they say that the elections are peaceful when more than 100 have died and the death count is expected to get higher?? said Bayan chair Carol Araullo.
(more…)