EDITORIAL - Great legacy

In her overseas trips, among the pieces of good news that President Arroyo brings to expatriate Filipinos is the passage of the absentee voting law. Shortly after her state visit to the United States, a team from the Commission on Elections will reportedly arrive in California, home to one of the biggest Filipino communities in the United States, to conduct seminars on the Overseas Voting Act of 2003.

This should remind everyone that it’s just 11 months to the general elections. The polls are so close that one opposition candidate has already announced his intention to run. There are reports that the administration is also set to pick its own standard bearer soon from a field that has been narrowed down to four.

The results of these elections will determine the course of the nation in the new millennium. Those who get elected in 2004 must take the nation out of the rut that it has been in for many years, a rut that has made the nation a tail ender in the regional development race. We can’t afford to botch these elections, especially with the votes of millions of Filipinos overseas to be counted for the first time.

When President Arroyo returns to the country, she must turn her attention to preparations for the implementation of absentee voting. Whatever happens to the latest initiative to amend the Constitutions, the general expectation is that there will be elections next year and absentee voting will push through. Even as the nation waits for a final ruling from the courts on the constitutionality of the Overseas Voting Act of 2003, the government must move to make sure that if absentee voting does push through, it won’t end in disaster.

This means providing enough funds for absentee voting, preparing all the paraphernalia needed, assigning personnel and giving them all the necessary training to carry out credible elections. This includes training them to detect and discourage poll fraud. For the woman who only wants to be a good president, credible elections in 2004, with absentee voting successfully launched, would be a great legacy.