Comelec: 400,000 double registrants for barangay polls

MANILA, Philippines — The Commission on Elections has so far uncovered more than 400,000 double or multiple registered voters for the barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan elections (BSKE) on Oct. 30.

Comelec Chairman George Erwin Garcia yesterday said these double or multiple registrants registered from Dec. 12, 2022 to Jan. 31, 2023.

He hopes that the Comelec would finish its assessment by the end of May. He added that the Comelec expects the number of double/multiple registered voters to reach 500,000.

Since 2010, the commission has been implementing its Automated Fingerprint Identification System that allows them to match the fingerprint of one registrant to fingerprints belonging to around 68 million other registered voters nationwide.

In line with the cleaning of the list of registered voters, Garcia added that they are also planning to meet with all the election registration boards.

“We would be issuing a directive to hold a special meeting of Election Registered Boards in the entire country so that we could weed out the (double/multiple registered) voters,” Garcia said.

In an interview with ANC, he noted that the Comelec would run after those behind the fraudulent registrations.

“We are going to expose that. We are going to make a detail as to when or where all the places where there are double or multiple registrants,” Garcia said.

Sen. Imee Marcos earlier pushed for a Senate investigation on the questionable surge in voter registrants for the forthcoming village and youth polls.

The poll body earlier said it would release the voters’ list for the BSKE before Aug. 1.