Comelec: Deactivated voters exceed new ones 

SYSTEMS CHECK Voters inspect infographics from the Commission on Elections displayed at their voting places during a recent plebiscite in Caloocan City. —Lyn Rillon

MANILA, Philippines — Less than a month before the voter registration for the 2025 midterm election ends, the Commission on Elections’ (Comelec) list of deactivated and delisted voters has grown longer, and even outpaced the number of applications it has received.

Based on the data provided by Comelec Chair George Garcia on Sunday, the the poll body has processed a total of 5.9 million voter registration applications, which are still pending approval or disapproval by election registration boards (ERBs).

However, those who could not cast their vote next year are far greater at more than 6 million: 5,376,630 voters who are deactivated; and 714,152 people deleted from the national list of registered voters.

READ: Comelec: 5.8 million new voters’ applications processed so far

The deactivated and deleted voters would be deducted from the current total number of voters, which was 67,839,861 during the October 2023 barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) elections.

Almost all of the 5.3 million voters who were deactivated failed to vote in two consecutive regular elections—particularly the May 22, 2022, national and local elections and Oct. 30, 2023, village and youth council elections.

They may also be deactivated if they were excluded as ordered by court, failed to validate their records, lost Filipino citizenship, declared to be insane or incompetent and after being convicted with finality for a serious offense.

Grounds for deactivation

Meanwhile, a voter’s registration is deleted if a person’s fingerprints based on the Automated Fingerprint Identification System are found to be identical to another person, death as confirmed by the local civil registrars, transfer of records to another locality, or if the voter has double or multiple records at the city or municipal level.

Garcia has been calling on voters who are deactivated to apply for reactivation, to be able to vote next year—where three elections are slated—the national and local elections and Bangsamoro parliament elections in May, and barangay and SK elections in December.

The application may be filed at the local election office, which has jurisdiction over one’s voting precinct, or in selected satellite registration and “Register Anywhere Program” stations until Sept. 30, when the voter’s registration period ends.

More than 18,000 vacancies

In a Viber message to journalists on Sunday, Garcia said Sunday that over 18,000 national and local positions will be open to be filled in the election.

“With 18,271 positions to be filled up, easily we can have 500,000 aspirants in the 2025 national and local elections and Bangsamoro parliamentary elections,” Garcia said in his message.

For national positions, the vacancies include 12 senatorial seats, 63 for party lists, and 254 for congressional district representatives.

As for the local offices, 82 seats will be available each for governors and vice governors and 792 for provincial board members.

For city positions, there will be 149 seats each for mayors and vice mayors and 1,682 seats for councilors.

At the municipal level, the available positions are 1,493 seats each for mayors and vice mayors and 11,948 seats for councilors.

For the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region for Muslim Mindanao, 80 seats will be available in the local parliament.

The filing of certificates of candidacy (COCs) will be from Oct. 1 to Oct. 8.

Comelec has set the deadline to request a transfer of venue for the filing of COC on Sept. 20.

In a resolution, the poll body said the election officer, provincial election supervisor, or regional election director of the National Capital Region may receive the requests on any of the following grounds: security concerns of Comelec employees and workers; insufficient or limited office space; and such other grounds as may be approved by the Commission.