Much to everyone's surprise ...

No matter how much negative comments and bashing they got from the media and those last minute flash card snafus. In all fairness, one has to admit that the Comelec did a good job in the country's first automated election. Even with long lines and isolated failures, the PCOS machines did their job and for the first time in the country's history, we are enjoying credible results a day after the election.

From my observation, solving the long queues for the next election should be quite simple. They just need to add more machines and increase the number of voting precints. The process was actually already ok, there was just too many voters for the number of machines allocated.

My own personal experience was pretty positive. I was up in Clark with the family for the long weekend. So I arrived in Manila at around 4PM already and I immediately went to cast my vote in my old high school. And there was absolutely no line. I sauntered up to the desk, got my ballot, shaded my choices, placed it in the PCOS machine, and got my finger inked. I was done in about 15 minutes. My brother went in the morning and he said that he waited 2 hours in line.

So if you think about it, it was just a matter of too many people wanting to vote in the morning, at least in my area.

If you care any iota about the Philippines and its economy, then we can all heave a sigh of relief. Who wins is actually much less important than the fact that we had a fairly successful credible automated election. The worst case scenario of an election failure would have been a big blow to our country's already reeling state .

The successful staging of the election should now allow our country to move on and focus on the bigger problems. One side comment. You really cannot underestimate the charisma of Erap. Even with all the things that he did last time. Filipinos are still voting for him. Everyone thought it was going to be an Aquino-Villar battle, but he is a surprisingly strong 2nd place with Villar a far third. I don't think he's going to win. But his numbers are amazing considering all past events. Hindi mo tuloy alam kung he's really that popular and charismatic or that our masa is really that stupid. No offense. But seriously, that's the only conclusion you can make.