Mindanaotoday.com | Comelec in Oro runs out of priority numbers
By: Uriel Quilinguing
CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY – Minutes before the Commission on Elections (Comelec) in Cagayan de Oro would officially accept applications for voter’s registration 8 a.m. on Tuesday, January 31, priority number stabs have already run out.
This, even as hundreds of would-be electorates flock at the Robinsons Cagayan de Oro mall, Limketkai Center, where a satellite voter’s registration site was, wishing to beat the deadline of a 42-day listing period that started December 12 last year.
City Election Officer Ramil Acol said they have given out 800 priority number stabs, including the 100 allocation for senior citizens and persons with disabilities – double the 400 registrants which was the daily average since last week.
Acol said they can process more than 800 voter registrants in a day, based on its 11 personnel compliment and equipment support, but voter’s listing turnouts particularly those held in villages during the earlier days were only about 300 in day.
In a forum held earlier, the City Election Officer reported that they had registered 11,514 new and reactivated voters in Cagayan de Oro, as of January 23, this year—roughly 40 percent of its 19,000 target for the October 30 Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan Elections (BSKE).
But the City Comelec Office should have listed in at least 600 electorates every day – from the very start–to meet the projected five-percent increase in the number of voters over the 376,000 in the May 2022 elections.
Annie Jane Duhaylungsod of Cagayan de Oro-based Radio Mindanao Network’s DxCC had reported the queuing of city residents at the voter’s satellite registration site even if distribution of priority number stabs stopped shortly past 7 a.m.
Duhaylungsod said the long line of people reached as far as Grand Caprice Restaurant from the main entrance of Robinsons Cagayan de Oro mall along Florentino Street, Limketkai Center.
Acol, however, clarified that after they have processed the 800 who are holders of priority numbers, they still accepted other applicants – even without priority numbers, but that was only until 5 p.m.
He reiterated his earlier appeal to would-be voters to register early to avoid the inconvenience of queueing, and failure to register even after waiting for hours.
This, he said, was the reason why the Commission decided to allow the setting up of satellite registration sites and lengthening the registration period to 42 days, thus making the process convenient and with ample time for those who wish to cast their votes for the first time, or those whose voter’s registration has been deactivated for failure to vote in two successive elections. (MT)
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