By Leslie Ann Aquino
The Commission on Elections (Comelec) will be cleansing the voters' list used in the May 2019 midterm polls before the resumption of the registration period next month.
Commission on Elections (MANILA BULLETIN)
Comelec-Elections and Barangay Affairs Department Dir Teopista Elnas said they will update their records in order to cleanse the list of voters.
"We want to know how many are for deactivation, as well as those who died, based on the records of the Local Civil Registrars," he told Radyo Comelec.
There was a total of 61,843,771 registered voters in the last polls.
Based on the Voter's Registration Act of 1996, among the grounds for deactivation of registration are: being sentenced by final judgment to suffer imprisonment for not less than one year; adjudged by final judgment of committing crime involving disloyalty to the government, such as rebellion, sedition, violation of the anti-subversion, and firearms laws, or any crime against national security; being declared by competent authority to be insane or incompetent.
Those who did not vote in the two successive preceding regular elections; any person whose registration has been ordered excluded by the Court; and any person who has lost his Filipino citizenship will also be deactivated while registration records of those who have died as certified by the Local Civil Registrar shall be cancelled.
The poll body earlier announced that the voter registration will run from August 1 to September 30, 2019, inclusive of Saturdays and holidays.
The last voter registration period was held from July 2, 2018 to September 29, 2018, before it was suspended again to give way to the May 2019 midterm polls.
The Barangay and SK elections are scheduled to be held on the second Monday of May 2020.