Coming Soon

Folks, here are two of the important events that Filipinos will sure to watch out for this first half of 2010.


First is, of course, our pride Manny 'Pacman' Pacquiao's match against welterweight Joshua Clottey on March 13 in Arlington, Texas.

The fight went about right after the highly-anticipated megabout between Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather, Jr. didn't push thru after failed negotiations from both parties.

Early on, Pacquiao is the heavy favorite over the virtually unknown but equally dangerous Clottey. But despite of this, Filipinos are still sure to cheer on and watch their favorite Filipino boxing icon floor down his opponent.

Immediately after the fight, Pacquiao's thoughts will immediately shift from sports to politics with the national elections coming in May 2010.

This brings us to our second important event- and that is the introduction of the Poll Automation on May.

Although the Commission on Elections (COMELEC) boasts that we will go into full automation, a lot of people are still apprehensive about it.

For one, the machines have not yet arrived. Smartmatic and Comelec has promised that the machines will arrive on February 2010 (this was originally scheduled to arrive on December 2009).

Political analysts see some problems regarding the Poll Automation:

1. Because the machines have not yet arrived, do officials still have time to inspect if the machines will work properly?

2. The teachers (who will officiate in the elections) were not yet oriented with the use of the machine; and/or with the new procedures on poll automation.

3. Most of the voters are still uneducated with the use of the machines- thus errors might happen during the election day. How do we fill up the form? What are we going to do if we want to change our votes (or can we still change our votes)? How do we submit the ballot in the machine, etc....

For these (and many other reasons), some people do have fear that there might be problems that will arise during the elections; or worse, failure of elections can occur in some areas.

But let us all hope that things will work out fine.

Above all, let us ensure to choose and vote only those people who deserve to be elected.