Poll watch dog LENTE: Assisted voting abuse widespread amid 2026 BARMM elections

The Legal Network for Truthful Elections (LENTE) Philippines flagged alleged widespread abuse in assisted voting during the first parliamentary elections in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) on Monday, citing irregularities in both the shading and feeding of ballots.

In a press release, the poll watchdog revealed it monitored 187 voter assistance incidents, which accounted for roughly 37% of the 501 total voting process-related reports it logged.

“The abuse of the assisted voting privilege was a prevalent issue across the BARMM region,” LENTE said.

“... This high number of assisted voting is a serious vulnerability in itself, as it opens the door to violations of ballot secrecy, and in its worst form, an assistor is no longer assisting the voter at all but substituting their own choice for the true will of the electorate,” it added.

LENTE said it monitored at least 137 instances of voters failing to personally feed their ballots into automated counting machines (ACMs)—a direct violation of Commission on Elections (Comelec) General Instructions.

According to the poll watchdog, these irregularities escalated throughout election morning.

In Maguindanao del Norte, reports indicated that some voters left polling centers before their ballots were fed into the ACMs.

“In Maguindanao del Norte, monitors reported that by mid-morning, some voters were leaving the polling place before their own ballot had even been fed into the machine, letting the watcher complete the process in full,” LENTE said.

The group added that loss of ballot control turned coercive at one voting center in the province, where poll watchers engaged in vote-buying.

“This loss of control over the ballot turned coercive at one voting center in Maguindanao del Norte, where monitors documented watchers and other individuals forcing voters to vote for a specific party and handing them money in small envelopes immediately after they voted, alongside unauthorized persons entering the polling place and more than the permitted three assistors helping a single voter,” LENTE reported.

LENTE also noted that seven monitors observed individuals carrying firearms inside voting centers across several areas in the region.

“Since the opening of the elections, LENTE received reports from 7 monitors who observed persons carrying firearms inside the voting centers,” the group said.

Monitors reported that gun sightings were concentrated in Talitay, Maguindanao del Norte—where weapons were recorded on three separate occasions—and in Marawi City, Lanao del Sur, which had three additional sightings.

Meanwhile, disorderly behavior around polling places was recorded in 58 out of 492 monitoring reports, concentrated mainly in Lanao del Sur, Maguindanao del Norte, and Maguindanao del Sur. —Lyjah Tiffany Bonzo/RF, GMA News