THE proposed watchlist to monitor multiple registrants is an invitation to “civil chaos,” said House Speaker Prospero Nograles.
Nograles said it would be easier if the job of delisting multiple and zombie registrants would be accomplished by Commission on Elections (Comelec) alone rather than rely on a watchlist where human intervention may take place.
“This is a lot simpler than making a watchlist. Our registered voters should only have one registration and all the Comelec should do is to cross-check against their various computer database. We have computerized our election so that we can precisely remove all these spurious registrants,” Nograles said.
According to him, setting up a watchlist provides no assurance that the people who will be chosen to lead it, has no partisan leanings.
Lawmakers also posed concern that the House of Representatives, which serves as the Board of Canvassers for the election of the President and Vice President, might have difficulty announcing the winner if the issue of the multiple registrants is raised in the canvassing.
In case of doubts on the issue within the electoral tribunal itself, a failure of elections may ensue.
Earlier, House members urged Nograles to call for awareness on a possible failure of elections due to the presence of duplicate voters.
But lawmakers were one in saying that a watchlist will be a waste of time and Comelec should just do the delisting itself.
Cagayan de Oro Representative Rufus Rodriguez called the suggestion to put up a watchlist a farce because no such thing is indicated in the Omnibus Election Code.
For his part, Isabela Representative Rodolfo Albano III said the Comelec has the sole authority to scrutinize and delist all double, multiple, and dead registrants from the voters' list.
Comelec at the same time has enough funds to carry out the action, according to Rodriguez.
“Congress allotted a P10.3 billion for the 2010 national elections, P7.2 billion of which went to poll automation. We still have P3.1 billion left which Comelec can use in cleaning the voters’ list,” Rodriguez said.
Nograles earlier questioned why the Comelec overlooked the double registration of more than 9,000 residents in Davao City while the names of some 13,000 registered voters disappeared.
On the other hand, Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting (PPCRV) Howard Calleja revealed that there are over 40,000 flying voters in Davao City and Davao del Sur.
Calleja said if the 40,000 voters are multiplied to the country's 40,000 provinces, there might be three to four million flying voters for the upcoming elections, which can make or break the presidential and vice presidential race results.
Cavite Representaive Crispin Remulla meanwhile called on the Comelec to take the revelation seriously and purge the list of spurious registrants right away. (Angela Casauay/Sunnex)