Report: Absentee voting for journalists pushed in Senate

MANILA, Philippines - Sen. Manuel Villar on Tuesday filed a resolution seeking to give media practitioners access to absentee voting, a radio report said. Villar said he had decided to file the resolution as some members of the media fail to cast their votes during elections because they are usually out on an assignment to cover the polls. In Senate Resolution 3074, journalists are allowed to pick his favored candidates even if they are not in their home towns at the time of the conduct of elections. Absentee voting under the present electoral law only covers overseas Filipino workers, government employees, policemen and soldiers. In the 2007 mid-term polls, the Department of Foreign Affairs said more than 500,000 OFW absentee voters were able to register from 156 countries. Some expatriates voted through mail, while most of them trooped to Philippine embassies and consulates. However, voter turnout in 2007 was 21 percent, considerably smaller than the 65 percent turnout in the 2004 presidential elections. Villar, along with Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel, had filed Senate Bill 2333 that sought to add revisions to the Overseas Absentee Act of 2003 (Republic Act 9189), giving OFWs the option to vote personally or by mail. - Mark Merueñas, GMANews.TV