Comelec union wants posts for insiders

Comelec office. FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines—Rank-and-file employees of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) urged President Aquino to consider appointing “insiders” as successors of retiring poll officials.

Comelec Chair Sixto Brillantes and commissioners Lucenito Tagle and Elias Yusoph are all set to retire on Feb. 2 next year.

“The Comelec Employees’ Union (Comelec-EU) expresses its firm position that insiders should fill the impending vacancies in Comelec,” the union said in a statement.

“There is no shortage of qualified officials from within the ranks,” it added, but did not make any recommendation.

The three retiring election officials were not “insiders” in the poll agency.

Brillantes was a veteran election lawyer before he was appointed by Mr. Aquino to head the Comelec.

Tagle was a retired Court of Appeals justice while Yusoph was a provincial prosecutor in Marawi City before they were appointed to the poll body by then president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

The Comelec-EU stressed that appointing an insider was crucial considering the proximity of the 2016 national and local elections.

“Appointing insiders, who are no longer strangers to the inner workings of the Comelec and the fundamentals of the country’s electoral processes, will certainly benefit the nation as a whole,” the union said.

It added that having an insider appointed as a member of the commission en banc would improve the rights and welfare of rank and file employees of the Comelec. Tina G. Santos