Foreign Affairs Secretary said that the Department of Foreign Affairs would redouble its efforts to encourage more overseas Filipinos to register to vote in coming elections.  The Secretary made this statement in reaction to reports that registration turnout has been slow.

“The Comelec, in coordination with our foreign posts, has set in place a system of overseas voting registration that uses the latest in technology not only to ensure the sanctity of the registration and voting process but also to make registration as convenient as possible, as we are very aware of some of the constraints our overseas Filipinos are under in terms of their time and their distance from our posts,” Secretary Ople said.  “But I believe that it may be a little too early to speculate that there will be a low turnout for the overseas voter registration,” the Secretary added, saying that he remained optimistic that the pace of voter registration will pick up.  Overseas Absentee Voter registration will be conducted from 1 August to 30 September 2003.As of 7 August, over eight thousand overseas Filipinos had registered.

The Commission on Elections and the Department of Foreign Affairs recently conducted at the DFA Auditorium a training program on the use of the Data Capturing Machines that will be utilized for the registration of overseas absentee voters at Foreign Service establishments worldwide.

Attending the program were over 80 representatives from Philippine Foreign Service Posts as well as the Manila Economic and Cultural Office in Taiwan, and 50 home-based foreign service personnel from the Department of Foreign Affairs. (please see DFA Press Release No. 364-03, 17 July 2003).

The Secretary said that the Department will also double its efforts in their information campaign to encourage more overseas Filipinos who are qualified to vote, to register.  He added that there may be lessons to be learned and that after the first overseas absentee voting is conducted, there will be a need to look into possible improvements to the law.

The Secretary said that the Department is also negotiating with other countries to allow Philippine posts to register voters in places other than embassies or consulates.  He explained that under the Overseas Absentee Voting law, registration can only be carried out in diplomatic or consular premises. “We are asking host countries to recognize our satellite registration sites as temporary diplomatic or consular premises. In this way, we will be able to register more voters,” the Secretary said.

With regard to satellite registration centers, the Secretary announced that the government of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has allowed the Philippine Embassy to register voters in Al-Hobar, on the eastern part of Saudi Arabia. “Ambassador Bahn Guinomla has just reported that the Saudi Government will recognize our satellite registration center as diplomatic premises.  This is an important development as this satellite center will be able to service the registration needs of about 300,000 Filipinos who might otherwise not be able to go to our embassy on Riyadh or our consulate in Jeddah,” the Secretary said (please see related DFA press release).

“The Philippine Government deeply appreciates the cooperation given by the government of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia that will allow our countrymen to exercise their right to vote,” the Secretary said. END.