BACOLOD City – At least 24,759 individuals may have their status deactivated by the city Commission on Elections (Comelec) for failure to vote in two successive preceding elections.
The Election Registration Board (ERB) is set to hold a hearing on April 15 to 19 where the deactivation of inactive voters will be approved, according to City Comelec officer Kathrina Trinio-Caña.
Based on Comelec records, this city had a total of 340,098 registered voters during the barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan elections held last year.
Apart from failure to participate in the past two elections, the Voter’s Registration Act of 1996 states that among the grounds for deactivation of registration are: being sentenced by final judgment to suffer imprisonment for not less than one year; adjudged by final judgment of committing a crime involving disloyalty to the government, such as rebellion, sedition, violation of the anti-subversion and firearms laws, or any crime against national security; and being declared by competent authority to be insane or incompetent.
Any person whose registration has been ordered excluded by the Court and who has lost his Filipino citizenship will also be deactivated, while registration records of those who have died as certified by the Local Civil Registrar shall be canceled.
Trinio-Caña explained that an individual may file for reactivation of the registration record with the Comelec office.
She said the agency will also send a notice to those whose record of registration has been deactivated.
Based on Comelec-Bacolod records as of April 10, more than 14,000 have applied for registration.
Of which, 12,228 will be taken up during the hearing as part of ERB’s first quarter schedule, covering the period from February 12 to March 26. The hearing for more than 2,000 applicants will be included in the second quarter schedule set for July.
The last day for voter registration will be September 30./PN
