#ASKGOYO
Atty. Gregorio Larrazabal
Recently, there was a request sent by some legislators and stakeholders to COMELEC to extend the period for voter registration, which is scheduled to end September 30, 2021. I had posted on social media that it would be problematic for the Commission to extend the period to allow people to register as voters beyond September 30, as this would have a ripple effect on the numerous preparations needed to be done by COMELEC and would create a number of problems which could affect the May 9, 2022 Presidential Elections. I had, instead, proposed that COMELEC allow voter registration on weekends during the remaining weeks of August and September. This would allow more applications to be processed, and still not affect the timeline in the preparations.
The COMELEC En Banc came out with a ruling on the request last week, denying the request for the extension of the period to register as voters. However, the En Banc ordered that the office hours of the City & Municipal offices of COMELEC be extended by 2 hours. Previously, the schedule to process applications for voter registration was Monday till Friday, from 8:00 in the morning until 5:00 in the afternoon. The new schedule is Monday to Friday, from 8:00 a.m. until 7:00 p.m. Added to this, COMELEC field offices are to be open on Saturdays and holidays, from 8:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m. This is a big boost in encouraging people who are working, to go to the city or municipal COMELEC office to apply as registered voters.
COMELEC is also working with mall owners to allow people to register as voters in certain malls. I suggest going to the COMELEC website, www.comelec.gov.ph, or you can go to their Twitter account: https://twitter.com/comelec for more information.
Please be reminded that the new schedule takes effect today, August 23. The COMELEC field offices are open in areas under GCQ and MGCQ. So, please don’t wait till the last minute to register as a voter. Do it as soon as possible.
If you have questions, you can contact me on Twitter https://twitter.com/GoyYLarrazabal
Stay safe. Stay healthy. Wear a mask. Register as a voter.