ILOILO City –People do not give much importance to barangay elections, lamented Atty. Tomas Valera, Commission on Elections (Comelec) assistant regional director.
He cited the voter turnout in last month’s synchronized barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) elections in Western Visayas – 76.78 percent.
A total of 4,475,949 Western Visayans registered for the barangay polls held on May 14, with 3.3 million actually voting, said Valera.
For the SK election, 1.1 million voted out of 1,588,499 registered youth voters, Comelec-6 data showed.
The figures were not surprising, said Valera. Voter turnout in previous barangay elections in the region was also around 70 percent.
The national voter turnout, on the other hand, was at 80 percent, said Valera.
Why is a 100-percent voter turnout in barangay elections hard to attain?
“People do not give much importance sa barangay elections,” said Valera.
Others are busy with work, out of the country or far from where they have registered to vote, he further said.
Valera, however, clarified that the failure to vote in last month’s election does not necessarily mean a voter won’t be able to vote in next year’s mid-term election.
The failure to vote in two successive previous elections is what disqualifies a voter from voting in the 2019 election, he said.
For these persons, it is a must to register again to vote, said Valera./PN