Cebu City has 43T new voters, close to 14T in Lapu-Lapu City

CEBU, Philippines — The Commission on Elections (Comelec) has tallied over 43,000 additional voters for Cebu City and at least 13,442 individuals in Lapu-Lapu City for the May 2019 elections.

South District Election Officer Edwin Cadungog told reporters that since July until the last day of registration last Saturday, they recorded 23,157 new registrants.

Based on their previous data, there are 360,421 registered voters in the south district in the last barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan elections.

As of press time, Cadungog could not yet give the definite number of registered voters for the upcoming midterm polls since they have to do cleansing.

“Dili pana mailhan karon kay kuhaon pana nato ang wala kabotar og kaduha, mag-cleansing paman ta,” he said yesterday.

For the city’s north district, Election Officer Marchel Sarno said they have tallied at least 20,462 additional registrants.

North district’s existing voters totaled 307,474.

Just like Cadungog, Sarno could not mention the total number of north district registered voters for 2019 midterm polls for they have to countercheck their records.

“Diri gyud sa Cebu makasulti ta og daghan kay ngano wala man ta’y new registrants… Mostly, ang transfer especially sa Cebu City ta nga ang mga tawo diri pipila ra ang lumad nga taga Cebu City gyud,” Sarno said.

In Lapu-Lapu City, the Comelec expected only about 10,000 individuals to register, but it exceeded.

Election Officer Janet Lamban also said the last day of registration period became chaotic during their offsite registration inside a mall because those last-minute filers persisted to register even without a priority number.

“On the last day. Ato sila gipahibaw gani atong pagka-Friday. Ato lang gyud gitagaan og sistema nga maglinya lang gyud sila.  In fact, naghatag nako daan og priority numbering pero mao gyud toy mauna pero tungod sa ilahang ka agresibo gyud kaayo, ila naman gani nadasmagan ang purtahan sa mall,” Lamban said.

Their persistence has damaged a glass door of the mall which prompted the mall security to roll down its screen door around 10 a.m. to control the situation.

“Pag-open pa sa mall gusto na sila mosulod sa mall. Di naman sila mosunod sa pagpa-line ug at the same time katong   priority una ang pasudlon. Gusto man sila tanan manud so, wala tay mahimo gi-close gyud ang door,” she said.

Lamban apologized to the mall management about the behavior of the people that time, as they really wanted to be registered.

The crowd, which was estimated to be around 600, eventually dispersed. And the registration was back to normal.

Meanwhile, since the filing of certificate of candidacies (COC) is quite near, the election officers have reminded the politicians to comply with the necessary requirements mandated under the law.

“Mao ni importante kung naa sila’y political party, kinahanglan naa sila’y Certification of Nomination and Acceptance (CONA) which is signed by their representative. Dapat naa’y notarization, documentary stamp, among others,” Cadungog said.

He added that their office is just ministerial in nature wherein they are going to accept every COCs which will be filed as long as all the necessary documents have been complied.

“Dili mi modawat og COC kung dili mao ang porma as prescribed by the commission or kulang ang data nga gi-submit,” he said.

Sarno also advised 2019 election bets to double check their required documents during the filing of COCs to avoid technical errors.

The filing of COCs will be from October 11 until October 17. (FREEMAN)