Mandaue police to help locate deactivated voters

Mandaue City police officers will help the Commission on Elections (Comelec) in Mandaue City to locate and inform deactivated voters in the city that they need not go to the polling centers on election day because they are no longer qualified to vote.

“We were thinking that if this number of people will not be informed that they could no longer vote, they will add to the delay of the elections and could be a possible cause of trouble,” said Senior Supt. Jonathan Cabal, Mandaue City Police Office chief.

Lawyer Ferdinand Gujilde, Mandaue City election officer, there are 12,064 deactivated voters in Mandaue City who are no longer qualified to vote on the May 2016 elections.

Gujilde said that deactivated voters are those who failed to vote in two consecutive elections and neglected to have themselves validated through Biometrics.

Cabal said he already ordered a team from the Police Community Relations (PCR) of the Mandaue Police office to get the names and addresses of the deactivated voters in the city so that they can help in notifying them.

Cabal said that he learned about helping notify deactivated voters to not go to the voting centers during the City Joint Security Coordination meeting.

Gujilde said that the Comelec had already sent out notification letters to these voters but there was no assurance that the letters were received.

Gujilde said they already initially gave the police 270 names and addresses of these deactivated voters,  hoping that the police can locate them.

Meanwhile, Gujilde said he was still waiting for updates from the Comelec Central Office with regard to the cancellation of inmate voting after the cancellation was announced last week.

He said that this was because of security reasons and the need for further preparations after adjustments were made when the Supreme Court ordered the printing of voters’ receipts.