Palace to Filipinos: Shun vote-buying; ensure honest, peaceful polls

MANILA, Philippines — Malacañang on Friday urged Filipinos to help ensure an honest and peaceful midterm election and called on voters to reject vote-buying.

“We’ll have to let the people decide,” Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo said, adding that it’s the only time that voters have the same power as “everyone in the Philippines.”

“We hope that all the agencies of the government, as well as the voters themselves and our countrymen, will be alert and will contribute to the peaceful and clean and honest voting in the polls,” Panelo told reporters in an interview in Malacañang.

Days before the May 13 elections, he said the practice of vote-buying must stop.

“Dapat talaga itigil na ‘yan (It should stop),” he said.

He cited some reasons why some Filipinos are victims of vote-buying.

“I will go back to my original advocacy even when I was still a young lawyer.” he said, explaining that the real problem in the country is that most voters “lack the educational requirements.”

Panelo said that voters who are not educated and are poor are easily intimidated or threatened and are open to accepting money.

“Kasi nga mahirap (Because they are poor) […] kasi tayong mga may pinag-aralan, hindi tayo boboto ng hindi kasing galing natin o mas magaling sa atin (because those of us who are educated will not vote for candidates who are not as good or even better than us),” he added.

He said he is hoping that all Filipinos would have access to education.

“Pag kulang ka sa tools, educational tools, siyempre iba ang magiging standard mo. But ‘yan ang goal natin (If you lack the tools — educational tools — your standards will be different. But that is our goal),” he said.

“Hopefully our countrymen will have education, all of us,” he said.

“The President has started it, right? There’s free education in high school. I am hoping that someday education will be free from prep to college for all Filipinos,” he added in Filipino. /ee

READ: As campaign hits homestretch, Comelec warns of vote-buying surge