By Greg Macabenta
If you think that the Commission on Elections has been purged of multi-million dollar hamburjers and million-vote phone pals, look again. This constitutional body is still infested with characters who cannot tell right from wrong.
When Congress passed the Dual Citizenship Law, Republic Act 9225, many of us who had become naturalized citizens of foreign countries welcomed the opportunity to reclaim our Philippine citizenship. The day the law became operative, I was with the first batch that crowded into the Philippine Consulate in San Francisco to become a Filipino citizens again.
At last, we would have an opportunity to exercise the right of suffrage, to participate in the choice of the leaders of the land of our birth, to contribute to its emergence from poverty not simply with our money remittances but also with our skills and other assets.
But we celebrated too soon. Comelec Chairman Benjamin Abalos – the Hamburjer Man, star of the NBN/ZTE multi-million dollar scandal – ruled that dual citizens could not vote in the 2004 elections. Led by Loida Nicolas-Lewis, then chair of the National Federation of Filipino American Associations (NaFFAA), several of us appealed to the Supreme Court to nullify the ruling.
On August 4, 2006, the high court ruled in our favor, decreeing that the Dual Citizenship Law was meant to “to “enfranchise as much as possible all overseas Filipinos.” Unfortunately, the decision came too late for us to vote in the Garcified presidential contest, where a million votes were added on to an Arroyo victory, but it allowed us to help bring in a new batch of senators – and kick out a lot of undesirable ones - in the 2007 polls.
Now comes the 2010 presidential elections, a monumental event in the continuing struggle of the Philippines to extricate itself from a fate of corruption, incompetence, crime and poverty. Like the invigorated American electorate who voted in large numbers in the last US presidential elections in their desire for “change they could believe in,” overseas Filipinos have become motivated to actively participate in the selection of the new Philippine president to ensure that all vestiges of the graft-ridden administration of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo are ejected and changed. Since the passage of the Dual Citizenship and the Overseas Absentee Voting Laws, the response of overseas Filipinos, particularly those in the US, had been embarrassing, to say the least. We had lobbied long and hard to have both laws passed by Congress, but when they were finally signed into law, only a handful of otherwise qualified Filipino voters took the trouble to register, and fewer still bothered to vote.
A January 19 story filed by GMA News gave these dismal numbers: “A total of 589,830 overseas Filipinos registered for the 2010 elections. According to the poll body’s statistics, 224,884 new voters were added to the list of 364,946 active voters from the past two elections. In addition to the land-based Filipinos, a total of 21,097 seafarers will also be allowed to vote in the 2010 elections.
“Since the OAV was signed into law in 2003, figures have not been encouraging. In the 2004 national elections, only 360,000 of the more than four million qualified overseas Filipinos had registered. Of this figure, only 65 percent or 233,092 actually voted.
“In the 2007 midterm elections, at least 145,000 more overseas Filipinos registered to vote but only 81,732 cast their ballots. Data from the Comelec indicated that the countries with the most number of overseas Filipino voters are Saudi Arabia with 111,549; Hong Kong, 95,355; and the United States of America, 40,430.
“In terms of geographic regions, the Middle East and African nations have the most number of overseas voters, with a total of 225,148. The Asia Pacific, meanwhile, has 215,548; Europe, 61,294; and North and Latin America, 66,743.”
Among the reasons for the poor response are provisions in the law that make it difficult to register and vote. But what has made a bad situation worse is the fact that the Comelec has not really done enough to encourage voter registration. In fact, it has actively discouraged registration in the forthcoming elections by setting the deadline a full month earlier, August 31 instead of the end of September.
In a case filed before the Supreme Court by Raymond Palatino on behalf of Philippine voters, the high court directed the Comelec to extend the registration period by 69 days. Encouraged by this, a FilAm from Boston, Maritess Salientes Bloom, filed a petition with the Comelec in Manila asking for an extension of 28 days for overseas voters. This effort was supported by NaFFAA and actively pursued by Loida Nicolas-Lewis and Rodel Rodis.
For some reason that defies logic, another overseas group, the Global Filipino Nation, headed by Vic Barrios, filed its own petition for extension but only asked for two extra days!
To further complicate matters, a private conversation between Lewis and a Comelec official, to the effect that the Bloom petition had been “approved,” was prematurely announced as a fait accompli. The celebration was cut short when the Comelec subsequently announced that the petition had, in fact, been denied.
As in the past, the leaders of NaFFAA are preparing to appeal this adverse decision to the Supreme Court. According to Rodis, the rationale given by the Comelec for denying the Bloom petition do not hold water. The Comelec avers that giving an extension of 28 days would upset the work schedule of the poll body, require more personnel and resources and, in effect, jeopardize the conduct of the elections. Rodis scoffs at this.
According to Rodis, “The Comelec rejected our petition because to grant it ‘would wreak havoc to the Commission's over-all preparations for the 10 May 2010 National and Local Elections. Petitioner must bear in mind that to set an additional registration period now would have a rippling effect to our Commission's schedules, which are already tight as it is.’
“First of all, for the information of the Comelec, overseas voters do not vote in ‘Local Elections’ just in case the Comelec was not aware of that. How would extending the registration period to overseas voters ‘wreak havoc’? The work would be done by the local consular officials who still have the voters registration machines. What kind of ‘rippling’ effect would it have? The Comelec made the same arguments against the Palatino petition and yet none of the ‘rippling effects’ it warned against materialized. Comelec would not need to hire any new workers to register the overseas voters.”
Added Rodis: “The Comelec's decision actually presents us with the opportunity to put the Comelec on trial for its gross incompetence and for completely ignoring the needs and interests of the overseas absentee voters.”
We can only hope for the best. The Supreme Court could rule in favor of overseas Pinoys – but past experience warns us that the decision could be made AFTER the 2010 elections. In such a case, the Commission on Elections would have succeeded in frustration our efforts to participate in the choice of the new president. It should be renamed, Consumisyon on Elections.
But we’re not entirely helpless. Those who have already registered should vote. And those who haven’t and can’t register should actively campaign for honest and competent candidates and direct their friends and families in the Philippines to do likewise.
Otherwise, heaven help the Philippines. We might yet end up with a new president named Money Villarroyo.
(gregmacabenta@hotmail.com)
If you think that the Commission on Elections has been purged of multi-million dollar hamburjers and million-vote phone pals, look again. This constitutional body is still infested with characters who cannot tell right from wrong.
When Congress passed the Dual Citizenship Law, Republic Act 9225, many of us who had become naturalized citizens of foreign countries welcomed the opportunity to reclaim our Philippine citizenship. The day the law became operative, I was with the first batch that crowded into the Philippine Consulate in San Francisco to become a Filipino citizens again.
At last, we would have an opportunity to exercise the right of suffrage, to participate in the choice of the leaders of the land of our birth, to contribute to its emergence from poverty not simply with our money remittances but also with our skills and other assets.
But we celebrated too soon. Comelec Chairman Benjamin Abalos – the Hamburjer Man, star of the NBN/ZTE multi-million dollar scandal – ruled that dual citizens could not vote in the 2004 elections. Led by Loida Nicolas-Lewis, then chair of the National Federation of Filipino American Associations (NaFFAA), several of us appealed to the Supreme Court to nullify the ruling.
On August 4, 2006, the high court ruled in our favor, decreeing that the Dual Citizenship Law was meant to “to “enfranchise as much as possible all overseas Filipinos.” Unfortunately, the decision came too late for us to vote in the Garcified presidential contest, where a million votes were added on to an Arroyo victory, but it allowed us to help bring in a new batch of senators – and kick out a lot of undesirable ones - in the 2007 polls.
Now comes the 2010 presidential elections, a monumental event in the continuing struggle of the Philippines to extricate itself from a fate of corruption, incompetence, crime and poverty. Like the invigorated American electorate who voted in large numbers in the last US presidential elections in their desire for “change they could believe in,” overseas Filipinos have become motivated to actively participate in the selection of the new Philippine president to ensure that all vestiges of the graft-ridden administration of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo are ejected and changed. Since the passage of the Dual Citizenship and the Overseas Absentee Voting Laws, the response of overseas Filipinos, particularly those in the US, had been embarrassing, to say the least. We had lobbied long and hard to have both laws passed by Congress, but when they were finally signed into law, only a handful of otherwise qualified Filipino voters took the trouble to register, and fewer still bothered to vote.
A January 19 story filed by GMA News gave these dismal numbers: “A total of 589,830 overseas Filipinos registered for the 2010 elections. According to the poll body’s statistics, 224,884 new voters were added to the list of 364,946 active voters from the past two elections. In addition to the land-based Filipinos, a total of 21,097 seafarers will also be allowed to vote in the 2010 elections.
“Since the OAV was signed into law in 2003, figures have not been encouraging. In the 2004 national elections, only 360,000 of the more than four million qualified overseas Filipinos had registered. Of this figure, only 65 percent or 233,092 actually voted.
“In the 2007 midterm elections, at least 145,000 more overseas Filipinos registered to vote but only 81,732 cast their ballots. Data from the Comelec indicated that the countries with the most number of overseas Filipino voters are Saudi Arabia with 111,549; Hong Kong, 95,355; and the United States of America, 40,430.
“In terms of geographic regions, the Middle East and African nations have the most number of overseas voters, with a total of 225,148. The Asia Pacific, meanwhile, has 215,548; Europe, 61,294; and North and Latin America, 66,743.”
Among the reasons for the poor response are provisions in the law that make it difficult to register and vote. But what has made a bad situation worse is the fact that the Comelec has not really done enough to encourage voter registration. In fact, it has actively discouraged registration in the forthcoming elections by setting the deadline a full month earlier, August 31 instead of the end of September.
In a case filed before the Supreme Court by Raymond Palatino on behalf of Philippine voters, the high court directed the Comelec to extend the registration period by 69 days. Encouraged by this, a FilAm from Boston, Maritess Salientes Bloom, filed a petition with the Comelec in Manila asking for an extension of 28 days for overseas voters. This effort was supported by NaFFAA and actively pursued by Loida Nicolas-Lewis and Rodel Rodis.
For some reason that defies logic, another overseas group, the Global Filipino Nation, headed by Vic Barrios, filed its own petition for extension but only asked for two extra days!
To further complicate matters, a private conversation between Lewis and a Comelec official, to the effect that the Bloom petition had been “approved,” was prematurely announced as a fait accompli. The celebration was cut short when the Comelec subsequently announced that the petition had, in fact, been denied.
As in the past, the leaders of NaFFAA are preparing to appeal this adverse decision to the Supreme Court. According to Rodis, the rationale given by the Comelec for denying the Bloom petition do not hold water. The Comelec avers that giving an extension of 28 days would upset the work schedule of the poll body, require more personnel and resources and, in effect, jeopardize the conduct of the elections. Rodis scoffs at this.
According to Rodis, “The Comelec rejected our petition because to grant it ‘would wreak havoc to the Commission's over-all preparations for the 10 May 2010 National and Local Elections. Petitioner must bear in mind that to set an additional registration period now would have a rippling effect to our Commission's schedules, which are already tight as it is.’
“First of all, for the information of the Comelec, overseas voters do not vote in ‘Local Elections’ just in case the Comelec was not aware of that. How would extending the registration period to overseas voters ‘wreak havoc’? The work would be done by the local consular officials who still have the voters registration machines. What kind of ‘rippling’ effect would it have? The Comelec made the same arguments against the Palatino petition and yet none of the ‘rippling effects’ it warned against materialized. Comelec would not need to hire any new workers to register the overseas voters.”
Added Rodis: “The Comelec's decision actually presents us with the opportunity to put the Comelec on trial for its gross incompetence and for completely ignoring the needs and interests of the overseas absentee voters.”
We can only hope for the best. The Supreme Court could rule in favor of overseas Pinoys – but past experience warns us that the decision could be made AFTER the 2010 elections. In such a case, the Commission on Elections would have succeeded in frustration our efforts to participate in the choice of the new president. It should be renamed, Consumisyon on Elections.
But we’re not entirely helpless. Those who have already registered should vote. And those who haven’t and can’t register should actively campaign for honest and competent candidates and direct their friends and families in the Philippines to do likewise.
Otherwise, heaven help the Philippines. We might yet end up with a new president named Money Villarroyo.
(gregmacabenta@hotmail.com)
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