BARELY a week before the deadline for voter registration, the region’s Commission on Elections (Comelec) 7 has urged the public to avoid the so-called “last minute syndrome.”
“If you want to exercise your right of suffrage as guaranteed in our Constitution, you must register first,” said Comelec 7 spokesperson Omar Sharif Mamalinta, when asked about the tendency of many voters to procrastinate until the last day resulting to a rush of registrants at the end of every registration period.
The deadline for the registration of voters for the May 12, 2025 national and local elections is on Monday, Sept. 30 and there will be no more extensions.
In an interview with SunStar Cebu on Wednesday, Sept. 25, Mamalinta emphasized the importance of voting especially in a democratic government.
“Since we barely have a week before we finally culminate the activity about voter registration, we highly encourage the potential registrants to go to our office or to our designated satellite registration venues,” he said.
Last June 16, Mamalinta lamented that even though the Comelec offices open from Monday through Saturday and also on holidays, the turnout of voter registrants remained low.
As of Sept. 21, the total number of registered voters in Central Visayas was at 4,365,983 according to data given by Mamalinta.
The number is more than a million voters lower than the 5.4 million voters registered in the region before President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. signed into law a measures that created the new Negros Island Region (NIR) on June 13.
Before the start of the registration period, Comelec 7 recorded a total of 5,415,071 registered voters from the provinces of Cebu (3,384,198), Bohol (981,785), Negros Oriental (969,874), and Siquijor (80,214).
Since the start of voter registration on Feb. 12 until Saturday, Sept. 21, the region registered a total of 342,368 new voters for Cebu (285,347) and Bohol (57,021). / CDF
