ILOILO City – The Commission on Elections (Comelec) Region 6 registered a higher voter turnout during the Oct. 30 barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan elections (BSKE) in Western Visayas.
Of the 6.9 million voters, 76.32 percent or 5,266,080 trooped to polling centers across the region to cast their votes, according to Comelec-6 director Atty. Dennis Ausan.
He said the 76.32 percent is an ideal percentage for Comelec-6 because the usual voter turnout every barangay and SK elections is only 75 percent.
However, it is lower than the voter turnout of more than 80 percent during the May 2022 national and local elections.
Meanwhile, the slightly higher percentage of voter turnout in the recent elections showed that majority of the voters was interested to take part in the electoral process.
“We can conclude on the turnout nga tanan interesado gid nga mangin kabahin sang aton nga electoral processes bangod man nga nakita nila ang balor sang ila boto nga ini maka-contribute sa aton pungsod, sa pang-gobyerno kag pagpadalagan sang aton serbisyo- publiko,” Ausan told Panay News.
The Comelec-6 director is also elated of the active participation of the youth sector.
“Makita naton especially sa paglibot naton nga ang aton nga youth sector naggwa gid kag nag-participate sa elections,” he said.
There were a total of 5,179,738 registered voters for the barangay election and 1,764,423 for the SK election in the region, based on the results of the hearing conducted by the Election Registration Boards (ERBs) in June this year.
In national level, the voter turnout in the barangay elections reached 75.76 percent, while the SK elections reached 76.08 percent, according to the Comelec.
This is higher compared to the barangay and SK polls in 2018 with 71.20 percent and 65.51 percent turnouts, respectively.
Also in 2018, 40.89 million or 71.2 percent of the 57.42 million registered voters casted their votes.
According to the Comelec, 67,839,776 voters were registered to vote for this year’s barangay elections as they are at least 18 years old.
There were 23,254,313 registered voters for the SK elections as they are 15 to 30 years old. The country has 42,027 barangays in 148 cities and 1,486 municipalities./PN
