CDO's compact flash cards delivered a day late

By Maricel M. Butardo, ABS-CBN News Northern Mindanao

CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY, Philippines - The reconfigured compact flash cards for the Precinct Count Optical Scan (PCOS) machines in Cagayan de Oro City’s 61 polling precincts arrived a day late.

Officials from the Commission on Elections (Comelec) delivered the compact flash cards on Saturday at 9 a.m. instead of on Friday as scheduled.

The city’s PCOS machines were immediately tested once the reconfigured compact flash cards were installed at 1 p.m.

However, the testing of 5 PCOS machines in one school was delayed by 2 hours because the machines were not in their proper polling precincts. Technicians had to figure out first which PCOS machine was meant for a particular precinct before they could be tested and sealed.

In one test, a PCOS machine reported a wrong date. The local poll officer shrugged off the error, saying all they have to do was set the correct date on the machine.

At the Central School, which has most of the city’s clustered precincts with 32, a defective PCOS machine was replaced by a backup machine. In one polling precinct, testing was delayed because the mock voters failed to arrive on time.

Once all the machines were tested and found to be working properly, they were sealed, marked and brought together in one heavily guarded room. They will be brought to the polling precincts on Election Day.