The Commission on Elections (COMELEC) affirmed its commitment to ensure the integrity of the electoral process and its enforcers, saying that this is a crucial step toward gaining the trust of Filipinos, especially with this year being a "super election year."
"More than anything else, the COMELEC should prioritize earning the trust of the people because no matter how good your process is, if the people don't trust it, there will always be doubt about the results," COMELEC Chair George Erwin Garcia said during a forum on electoral integrity and voter empowerment on Aug. 2.
The forum, organized by the International Center for Innovation, Transformation and Excellence in Governance (INCITEGov), provided a venue for civil society organizations (CSOs), academic groups, and government officials to discuss current and potential safeguards to uphold electoral integrity, as well as strategies and initiatives that will encourage and maximize political participation from Filipinos through and beyond casting their votes.
Two major polls are to take place in the country in 2025: the national and local elections scheduled for May 12, and the inaugural parliamentary elections of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) slated for Oct. 13.
A third one - the Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan (BSK) elections initially set for December - is still up in the air, as bills seeking its postponement are currently pending before Congress.
COMELEC chairperson George Erwin Garcia gave a detailed rundown of the initiatives that the commission is currently undertaking, including voter registration/verification and public testing of vote-counting machines-with the promise of ensuring that no one will be left behind and all votes will be transparently counted during the 2025 midterm polls.
During the forum, Garcia reiterated COMELEC's call to revise and update the four-decade-old Omnibus Election Code of 1985, stating that the outdated law no longer responds to the ever-evolving tactics of electoral malpractices and abuse of regulatory gaps.
He noted, as an example, the election offense of vote-buying. "The vote-buying in 1985 is nothing compared to the vote-buying in 2024. Because back then, there was no GCash or PayMaya yet." Garcia added that even if they put in place a regulation addressing vote-buying via e-wallets, it still won't be covered by the current election code. He said this "loophole" is why there have been almost no convictions despite numerous vote-buying cases filed.
Innovations in the upcoming elections
The May 12 midterm elections would see the launch of a number of innovations and improvements in the voting process.
Arguably the biggest of them all is the introductory use of the new automated counting machines (ACMs) leased from South Korean firm Miru Systems. Garcia expressed confidence in this new technology, promising that "the new machines would answer the question, 'was my vote counted?'" addressing voter skepticism.
The COMELEC will also roll out voter education sessions throughout the country - including in the "most remote" places - where it will conduct demonstrations on the proper use of ACMs in casting votes.
Various measures to boost voter turnout will also be implemented, specifically: an early voting option (5 a.m. to 7 a.m.) exclusive for senior citizens and people with disabilities, mall voting for individuals residing near shopping malls, and the establishment of approximately 1,000 Emergency Accessible Polling Precincts nationwide, located on the ground floors of schools so that elderly voters no longer need to go up to higher floors to cast their ballots.
Garcia said the COMELEC will also "create precincts" near the residences of Indigenous Peoples (IPs) communities to ensure their participation in the elections.
Meanwhile, an improvement in overseas voting comes in the form of internet voting, which could be done as early as 30 days before election day. Garcia said this method seeks to address the low voter turnout among overseas Filipinos during the 2022 national elections, when only two voting options were available: personal voting, which required individuals to visit the Philippine embassy or consulate in their respective country, and postal voting, where nearly 90 percent of the envelopes sent to overseas Filipinos were not returned, despite being free of charge.
Despite these innovations and efforts, Garcia reminded the audience of the forum how equally important it is to be vigilant about "irregularities outside the machine" that influence a person's vote. These include vote-buying, terrorism and intimidation tactics, election-related violence, and the threat of generative AI such as deepfakes.
Voters' low confidence in own political participation
One of the forum's reactors, Dr. Anthony Lawrence Borja of De La Salle University's Political Science and Development Studies Department, shared a study they conducted that showed how a significant fraction of voters believe they are incapable of participating in politics and can neither influence nor control the government outside the elections.
Dr. Anthony Lawrence Borja of De La Salle University's Political Science and Development Studies Department presents key insights from their recent study on voter behavior and political perception.
This is why, Borja said, most people see voting during the local and national polls as the simplest and only way to engage in governance.
Additionally, politics remains "too complicated" for many, which Borja believes to be an indication of the insufficient efforts of the government to bring politics closer to ordinary citizens.
"This is the result of a system that does not return the power to the voters," Borja said, "so if we are to hold a voter or civic education campaign, this is the problem we have to address."
He added that it is important to continue lobbying efforts, as it is the "most practical" means for ordinary citizens to compel politicians to take decisive action. However, Borja proposed changing the current approach to lobbying: rather than promising to support a politician in the next election if they take action, people should make it clear they will withhold their support if the politician fails to act.
Meanwhile, Enteng Vicente Barlos, a council member of the National Urban Poor Sectoral Council of the National Poverty Commission, pointed out the alarming disconnect in the voting behavior of the marginalized sector at the sectoral level, and at the local and national level.
Enteng Barlos, council member of the National Urban Poor Sectoral Council-National Anti-Povery Commission, talks about his experience and learnings as a local candidate during the 2023 BSK polls.
Drawing from his own experience of running for a position in the 2023 BSK polls, he observed that at the sectoral level, marginalized groups are "really good" at electing leaders "who will truly defend and fight for their rights." However, once the barangay or national elections come, they often fail to consider their fellow members as viable candidates to lead them.
He said that this discrepancy calls for a voter education campaign that would encourage a mindset shift in marginalized communities - veering away from the belief that their political participation is limited to just choosing among candidates from outside their own sectors.
BARMM elections experiences and challenges
Serving as the last of the forum's reactors, former National Commission of Muslim Filipinos secretary Yasmin Busran-Lao enumerated various issues confronted by non-government organizations and CSOs amid preparations for the very first parliamentary polls in the BARMM.
Yasmin Busran-Lao notes the pressing issues confronting CSOs as they prepare for the first parliamentary elections in BARMM.
She specifically mentioned the alarmingly low awareness of voters regarding the upcoming BARMM polls, saying it is a "huge challenge to make voters and citizens understand what a parliamentary form of government is."
Mostly affected by this weak information access and dissemination efforts are the marginalized sectors of women, non-Moro IPs, and the youth, Busran-Lao said.
Reading a statement issued by the Women Engaged in Action 1325 (WE ACT 1325), Busran-Lao also raised concern about the various difficulties faced by women sectoral organizations in acquiring certification and accreditation for the 2025 BARMM polls, including the delayed release of petition guidelines, the vulnerability of the process to "fly-by-night" organizations that do not actually represent the interests of the marginalized sectors, the "disheartening and discouraging" required docket fee of Php 10,600 (approx. USD 185) that further highlights sectoral organizations' budgetary constraints, and the permission granted to regional parliamentary political parties to organize their own sectoral wings, which WE ACT 1325 said will make way for a possible "breach [in] the spirit and the intent of sectoral representation and distort the principle of fair and democratic participation."
Busran-Lao ended by expressing hope that the COMELEC "will do its best to ensure that what we are fighting for will not be in vain." ?