As of 6pm today, 500 votes were cast in the UNTV mock polls. The target was supposed to be 1,000. The outcome does not depart so much from the estimates of Kontra Daya convenor Dr. Gani Tapang. An average of 50-60 voters were able to cast their vote every hour. At this rate. it would be extremely difficult to process 1,000 voters in 11 hours.

Some aspects of the mock polls did not reflect actual election conditions. There were of course many observers including the media, who crowded the polling precinct. There were also pre-selected voters who did not have problems looking up their names in the precincts. There were no stringent verification of the identities of voters, especially towards the end. Also, the BEI’s did not have to manually scan the ballots to show the UV marks on them. The UNTV mock polls showed near ideal conditions.

Come election day, we will all be watching how a huge turnout of voters can be processed in time for the closing of the precinct. Comelec and Smartmatic officials seem to think that the rate of the voting is good enough, probably since they do not expect a 100% turnout.

Yet even if the turnout is only 70%, the rate the voters are processed can still be considered slow. There will be glitches, complaints and other factors that can slow down the processing of voters.

Thus we ask, is there really enough time?