THE three-day local absentee voting from April 27 to 29 had 56 registered voters turn out based on the records of the Commission on Election (Comelec) in Baguio City.
Bulk of the local absentee voters came from the Armed Forces of the Philippines with 38, seven of which are from the Philippine Military Academy (PMA), six came from the Philippine Air Force (PAF), and three from the Philippine National Police and only two from the Comelec.
Baguio City Election Supervisor John Paul Martin said the 56 who availed of the local absentee voting registered earlier. The traditional manual voting scheme was implemented by the Comelec for the local absentee voters at the poll body’s office.
Covered by local absentee voting are government officials and employees, police, military and media practitioners who will not be able to vote in their own polling precincts on Election Day due to election-related duties.
Local absentee voters can vote only for president, vice president, senators and party-list organizations.
The Comelec official noted that only few takes advantage of the local absentee voting since voters give importance for their votes to the local candidates.
Members of the media were included in the list of those qualified for absentee voting in 2013.
Meantime, the Overseas Absentee Voting (OAV) started earlier in April 9 and will end on May 9. Similar to the local absentee voting, OAV is limited to voting for the positions of President, Vice-President, Senators, and Party-List groups.
The commission said there are now around 1.3 million registered OAV and they are expecting 50-60 percent voter turnout. (With reports from Cherene Joy Custodio/Colegio de Dagupan Intern)