After a successful nationwide automated polls, the barangay elections will go back to manual voting this coming October, an official from the House of Representatives said on Tuesday.

Makati City Rep. Teodoro “Teddy” Locsin Jr., chair of the House committee on suffrage and electoral reform, issued the statement immediately after facilitating a committee hearing regarding the alleged cheating in the recent automated presidential polls.

“I prefer to go back to hand written (elections),” Locsin said, expressing his preference against voter's shading an oval before a candidate's names on ballots.

Locsin explained that the lack of money intended for barangay elections left lawmakers to go back to manual voting even if majority of the legislators vow to train the electorate in automated elections.

“Even if we retain the shading, it will still be manual count because there's no money to automate that,” he explained. (Rio Rose Ribaya)