INQUIRER FILE PHOTO / NINO JESUS ORBETA
CEBU CITY, Philippines — Despite recording a drop in voters registration turnout last month, the Commission on Elections in Cebu (Comelec- Cebu) is optimistic that turnout will pick up as the deadline draws near.
Turnout in voters registration in Cebu island, when it was reverted to stricter quarantine classifications last August, dropped, said lawyer Lionel Marco Castillano, Comelec – Cebu Provincial Elections supervisor.
From an average of 3,000 per day, it plummeted to around 700 people per day. Between August 2 to September 11, Comelec-Cebu approved a total of 26,309 new voters’ applications on the entire island.
“It really was a big drop when Cebu was placed under MECQ (Modified Enhanced Community Quarantine) when all our election offices suspended registration so they won’t become sources of infection,” said Castillano in Cebuano.
To recall, last August, the cities of Cebu, Mandaue, and Lapu-Lapu were placed under MECQ in an effort to stem the surge of COVID-19 cases.
Twelve other localities belonging to the jurisdiction of Cebu province also followed suit.
These are Samboan, Sibonga, Argao, Cordova, Oslob, Liloan, Consolacion, Minglanilla, Sogod, and the cities of Talisay, Carcar, and Naga.
According to Castillano, a huge concentration of the island province’s voting population belonged to the areas that shifted to MECQ.
But when the entire island eased back to a more lenient General Community Quarantine (GCQ) on September 8, they observed a gradual increase in turnout of applicants.
Comelec-Cebu also said that the ongoing voters registration in satellite centers held in some of the biggest malls in Cebu City would greatly help compensate for the drop they recorded in August.
Cebu is the country’s most vote-rich province, with a voting population of no less than 3.3 million.
The deadline for voters’ registration will be on September 30. /rcg
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