Faster voting results seen in 2025 polls

Faster voting results are seen in the upcoming 2025 national and local elections (NLE) as new voting machines perform “flawlessly” and “faster” during a test run in Taal, Batangas, a Commission on Elections (Comelec) official said Friday.

In a televised briefing, Comelec spokesperson Atty. Rex Laudiangco said automated counting machines (ACM) reading was “very fast” at 200 millimeters per second, compared to the previous reading of only 70 millimeters.

Laudiangco added that amid the hot weather in Taal, the demonstration of the machine went flawlessly.

The official said that teachers, students, and government officials from the municipality who went on to try operating the ACMs were very happy as they were “functioning well” and “smoothly.”

Laudiangco also said that voters will not go home “clueless” if their votes were really counted.

“The good thing here is, in the old machines, like the PCOS and the VCM, we didn’t know how our votes were counted except for the receipt,” he continued.

“Here, there’s a big screen where the voters, once they enter their ballot, they can immediately see the image of the ballots themselves and the summation of how their ballots were counted, in addition to the larger receipt they would be holding,” he added.

In less than 10 seconds, voters would be able to see the receipts of their votes.

“If in the 2022 election we were fast, let’s expect the same speed,” Laudiangco said.

The official attributed the would-be faster election turnout to the better telecommunications infrastructure.

“In areas where our telco partners do not have a signal, the sets or the transmission provider will use the Starlink System. So we can count on better transmission services,” he assured.

Earlier, the poll body said it would launch a new transmission system for the 2025 polls that uses a “sent-to-all” feature, as it retires its previous transparency server.

Laudiangco said election results from the precinct level would be simultaneously sent to the media, election watchdogs, as well as various political parties.