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Power outage, water shortage thwart man’amko election
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Posted on Sep 05 2011
By Clarissa V. David
Reporter
Reporter
The election for the next Saipan Senior Advisory Council members last Friday was postponed to Tuesday this week due to a power outage and water shortage at the Aging Center.
“Because of these problems, we had to postpone the election and move it to Tuesday after Labor Day,” said Aging director Rose Mondala.
Mondala said the center did not have electricity when they got in so they checked the electrical panel. “The electrical panel got stuck. We had to wait for [Department of Public Works] to come,” she said.
Mondala said that power was restored around 10:30am.
Aging Office program coordinator Walter Manglona said that without power, the center did not have water as well, so they had to send home the congregates.
“The man’amko felt bad because they were so pumped up for that election,” he said.
According to Manglona, the man’amko went about the voting process in preparation for Friday’s elections.
Manglona said the 13 candidates campaigned for votes to the rest of the congregates on Wednesday. However, only the top 8 will be given a position in the council.
The 13 candidates are Alejandra Blas, Manuel Mesa, Christiana Michael, Elena Villanueva, Jacoba Asuncion, Jesus Pangelinan, Maria Salinas, Bernard Sebangiol, Meryalen Conrad, Sitae Terry, Rita Reyes, Siyau Muna, and Teresita Sorroza.
“Each candidate was given three minutes to talk about their plans once elected to the council,” said Manglona.
Manglona said that of the 13 candidates, four have college degrees and three are retired teachers.
According to Mondala, ballots with less or over 8 votes in tomorrow’s election will be considered null and void.
While they sent home the congregates, Mondala said they were able to take care of their homebound clients. She added that the center remained open on Friday to deal with walk-in clients.
