I heard a TV news report that Smartmatic-TIM encountered some problems with the New People's Army in Southern Luzon. Smartmatic-TIM spokesperson Gene Gregorio was interviewed and he said their personnel encountered communist rebels who demanded payment of the so-called access fee. Gregorio says the demanded amount was at least P5,000. I'm assuming the consortium was able to hurdle that obstacle easily.

In case you didn't know, the site surveys are being conducted to determine the availability of GSM network radio signals at the various poll precincts. GSM signals are needed for the transmission of election results.

According to the report, Smartmatic-TIM has so far  surveyed 93% of all precinct areas. It also noted that the signal in 10% of the surveyed areas is problematic. To address this, the consortium reportedly purchased 5,000 broadband satellites from Singapore.

Barring any more causes of delay like extortion attempts by armed groups, the survey in the remaining 7%  may be completed soon. The problem is these areas are all located in Mindanao as pointed out by Gregorio. Hopefully these are friendly areas where the risk of being harassed by armed rebels or worse armed bandits is nil.