Philippines
Israel, PH eye collaboration to ensure 'safe' election activities under pandemic
Israel, PH eye collaboration to ensure 'safe' election activities under pandemic
By Roy Mabasa
The Israeli government is now discussing with the Philippines how they could collaborate to ensure the safe conduct of next year’s national election in the country amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
Following the success of Israel's two elections that occurred in March 2020 and March 2021, Nir Balzam, Deputy Chief of Mission of the Embassy of Israel in Manila said they are ready to share their knowledge, information, and necessary tools to help the Philippines overcome the challenges posed by the pandemic during the campaign and election period.
“We had our experience in having two elections during the pandemic, one in the mid of the pandemic and one in the beginning. We are willing to share the information. I think the Philippine government and authorities are interested, we're discussing it,”, said the envoy during the virtual Pandesal media forum Wednesday.
But even before the possible collaboration could take place, the Israeli diplomat said the Philippines has to evaluate so many factors such as the vaccination status, profile of eligible voters, among others.
“I think there are few measures that the Philippines have to understand first before... what's the vaccination status, the eligible voters, there are still some things that they have to do before but we're collaborating on that,” Balzam explained.
Last month, a group of Israeli medical experts visited the Philippines and offered to share Israel’s experience in holding elections during the pandemic without the fear of further increasing the number of COVID-19 cases.
Chalm Markos Rafalowski, a member of the Israeli delegation, said the most important factor to ensure is to “set up a whole system”.
“We have plenty of experience both on putting the guidelines for political rallies, these kinds of activities but more important is how to set up a whole system. And during our last election day, we had the whole system to allow people to exercise their democratic right to vote and at the same time being able to maintain all the restrictions,” Rafalowski said.