The Election Registration Board (ERB) of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) in Bacolod City has disapproved six voter registration applications during their initial deliberation on Monday, April 15.
City Election Officer Kathrina Trinio-Caña said Wednesday, April 17, that in the initial ERB hearing, they evaluated at least 2,000 applicants, and of the number, six of them were disapproved because they have an existing record in other places.
She said that based on the national list of registered voters, the six applicants have the same names in other areas.
“They applied for a new registration, but they have an existing record in other places,” she added.
Trinio-Caña noted that they tried to contact the six applicants, but they failed to answer their cellular phones so that they could correct their applications here.
She said the disapproved applicants should apply for a transfer registration and not a new application.
“They can apply again for the correct time of application here at the Comelec office,” she said.
As of April 10, Comelec-Bacolod received a total of 14,000 new applicants.
Of the number, the documents of the 12,228 applicants, which were filed from February 12 until March 26, will be evaluated in an ERB hearing on April 15, while the applications filed from April to June 30 will be evaluated in July.
The ERB is chaired by Trinio-Caña along with its members, the Civil Registrar Office, and the Department of Education (DepEd)-Bacolod.
Moreover, Trinio-Caña said that they will also deactivate from their list the names of at least 24,000 voters after failing to vote in two consecutive polls.
She said it’s part of the cleansing of its database to delist, including the names of the voters who have died as certified by the local civil registrar, the voters who transferred to another district or municipality, and double registration.
She added that Bacolod City has a current 340,098 registered voters.*