Saturday, February 03, 2007 Teachers ‘have to serve’ during elections: DepEd
THREATS of a lawsuit and harassment by some candidates are valid concerns but public school teachers will have to serve in the May 14 elections, an education official said.
Department of Education (DepEd) Regional Director Carolino Mordeno said he understands the concern of public school teachers who are hesitant to render election duties.
But unless they are suffering from an illness or have relatives who are candidates, the close to 30,000 public school teachers in Central Visayas will not be exempted from serving in the elections.
Insubordination
Refusal to fulfill their election duties can be considered insubordination, Provincial Election Officer Edwin Cadungog said in an ABS-CBN TV Patrol interview yesterday.
Mordeno scheduled a meeting with division superintendents and the Commission on Elections (Comelec) officials this Wednesday to discuss the poll body’s guidelines on the role of teachers.
“Some teachers are hesitant because there are risks when performing election duties. Sometimes they are charged and are harassed by defeated candidates and when there are court litigations, the teachers spend their own money. These are valid concerns because it has happened in the past,” he told Sun.Star Cebu.
Cebu City Election Officer for the North District Marchel Sarno said Comelec guidelines on the role of the Board of Election Inspectors (BEIs) will be explained to the DepEd officials.
List
Mordeno said they will also come up with a list of the number of public school teachers in the region who can render election duties to find out if there are enough to cover the poll precincts.
Aside from public school teachers, private educators and government employees may also help in the elections as members of the BEI.
Members of the BEI will be tasked to administer the voting process, ballot counting, filling out of election return forms and come up with the total number of votes cast before these are submitted to Comelec for canvassing. (LCR)
