April 12, 2007
Updated 17:38:03 (Mla time)
Generoso Calonge, vice-chairman of the Department of Foreign Affairs’ Overseas Absentee Voting Secretariat (DFA-OAVS), said the bodies that will be assisting the voters -- the Special Board of Election Inspectors and Special Board of Canvassers -- have already been constituted.
The voting will be continuous, even during weekends and holidays, and will end at 3 p.m. Philippine time on May 14.
Of the 88 posts, 54 will be implementing voting by mail. These are: Abuja, Agana, Ankara, Baghdad, Bangkok, Berlin, Berne, Bonn, Brasilia, Brunei, Brussels, Bucharest, Budapest, Buenos Aires, Cairo, Canberra, Caracas, Chicago, Dhaka, Dili, Hamburg, Havana, Honolulu, Islamabad, Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, London, Los Angeles, Madrid, Manado, Taipei, Kaohsiung, Taichung, Mexico, Moscow, New York, Osaka, Ottawa, Paris, Prague, Pretoria, San Francisco, Santiago, Singapore, Stockholm, Sydney, Tel Aviv, The Hague, Tokyo, Toronto, Vancouver, Vienna, Washington, and Wellington.
There are 27 posts where voters will have to personally appear to cast their ballots are: Abu Dhabi, Amman, Athens, Beijing, Beirut, Doha, Dubai, Guangzhou, Hanoi, Hong Kong, Jeddah, Koror, Kuwait, Manama, Muscat, Nairobi, New Delhi, Al-Khobar, Macau, Port Moresby, Riyadh, Saipan, Shanghai, Tripoli, Vientiane, Xiamen, and Yangon.
There are also seven posts where modified voting by mail will be done: Geneva, Holy See, Milan, Phnom Penh, Rome, Seoul, and Tehran.
In voting by mail, ballots are mailed from the Commission on Elections to the voters’ addresses. In modified voting by mail, the ballots are mailed from the embassy, consulate, labor office or economic office to the voters. In both cases, the voters mail their accomplished ballots to the Philippine posts, where these will be counted and canvassed.
Although more posts will oversee voting by mail, more than a third of the 504,122 total registered overseas voters will still be casting their ballots in person.
Calonge admitted that a number of these voters stand to be disenfranchised because of the “fluidity” of migrant work. However could not give an estimate of how many these would be.
“Some would have gone home after their contract expires. By nature, [the] migrant workers’ situation is very fluid especially for those in Hong Kong, Saudi, and Singapore. It is possible that many of them would not be able to exercise their right [to suffrage],” he said.
“When an opportunity presents itself for them to move to a better job, they will. Changing their OAV registration address would be the last thing in their mind,” he added.
http://services.inquirer.net/express/07/04/13/html_output/xmlhtml/20070412-60022-xml.html
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