Quick count

PRESIDENT Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and actor Fernando Poe Jr. were neck and neck in the presidential race as of Monday night, according to partial and unofficial results of a quick count being conducted by a private computer school.

The quick count by AMA Education System showed Panfilo Lacson in third place, followed by Eddie Villanueva and Raul Roco.

As of 8:40 p.m., Ms Macapagal had 109,134 votes, while Poe had 108,642 votes, or a difference of only 492 votes.

Lacson had 53,186 votes, Villanueva, 27,212 and, Roco, 27,144.

In the vice presidential race, Loren Legarda was ahead of Noli de Castro by 16,921 votes. Legarda had 150,377 votes and De Castro, 133,456. Hermie Aquino had 20,101.

The votes came from 9,794 precincts, representing 3.3 percent of the total of 295,459 precincts nationwide.

Karim Bangcola, AMA executive president, said the 9,794 precincts were located in 62 towns and cities in Luzon, the Visayas and Mindanao.

AMA is conducting the quick count for "Eleksyon 2004," the coverage of the local and national elections by GMA-7, Philippine Daily Inquirer, Inq7.net, PLDT, Smart, Catholic Media Network, the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism, dzBB and New Media Inc.

AMA is owned by Amable Aguiluz V, presidential consultant on computer education during the Estrada administration. But Aguiluz is widely believed to be supporting Ms Macapagal.

The partial results came from Butuan (119 precincts), Legazpi (98), Balanga (1), Batangas City (153), Lipa City (96), Nasugbu, Batangas (33), Baguio (166), Tagbilaran (33), City of Valencia (119), Malolos (83), Meycauayan, Bulacan (80), Tuguegarao (223), Iriga (8), Naga City (145), Roxas (39), Bacoor, Cavite (47), Dasmariñas, Cavite (205), Cebu City (206), Lapu-lapu (129), and Mandaue (29).

Cotabato City (183 precincts), Davao City (272), Laoag (68), Iloilo City (77), City of Santiago (80), City of San Fernando (128), Biñn, Laguna (204), Calamba (187), San Pablo City (153), San Pedro, Laguna (133), Santa Cruz, Laguna (120), Tacloban (135), Cagayan de Oro (246), Manila (814), Caloocan (228), Las Piñas (336), Makati (271), Mandaluyong (171), Muntinlupa (67), Parañaque (199), Pasig (354), Quezon City (650), San Juan, Metro Manila (163), Valenzuela, Metro Manila (183), Bacolod (263), and Dumaguete (103).

Cabanatuan (147), Gapan (47), Puerto Princesa (38), Angeles (129), San Fernando City, Pampanga (117), City of Alaminos (30), Urdaneta (97), Dagupan (99), Lucena (87), Antipolo (210), Cainta, Rizal (130), City of Sorsogon (26), General Santos City (250), City of Tarlac (142), Olongapo (168), and Zamboanga City (277).

Bangcola said AMA's quick count would only last for 48 hours in line with the agreement it entered into with its partners in "Eleksyon 2004."

The election results were collected from the precincts by 15,000 AMA-trained volunteer students from 200 campuses of AMA and its sister schools.

Roving volunteer students progressively retrieved early tally results as they came in, beginning as soon as polling precincts started counting the votes. The roving tally retrievers then encoded and transmitted the preliminary results through a tamper-proof Internet facility to AMA processing centers in select AMA campuses.

The participating AMA schools are ABE, ACLC, AMACU, AMA Computer College, St. Augustine School of Nursing and Norwegian Maritime Academy.

To avoid duplication in the tally and to maintain the accuracy of the figures, the computers revert to zero as soon as the previous figures were transmitted to 80 processing centers.

From the processing centers, the early tally results were transmitted through the tamper-proof Internet facility to the AMA-GMA-7 Command Center on Edsa in Quezon City. The results were also faxed to the command center to ensure their veracity.

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  Last updated: May 11, 2004.