ZAMBOANGA CITY (MindaNews/08 August) – A total of 59,864 names were removed by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) after the poll body cleansed the list of voters for this city.
Lawyer Stephen Cañete, first district election officer, said Friday the number of registered voters in his area was trimmed down by 21,265 after the cleansing.
Cañete said from the previous number of 213,265 the first district now only has 192,000 voters.
Lawyer Lerdo Matildo Jr., second district election officer, said the number of registered voters in his district went down by 38,599.
Previously, Matildo said, his district had 199,396 registered voters but only has 160,797 after the cleansing.
Both officials said among the names that were deleted were those of voters who failed to vote in two successive elections, had already died, and of those who had moved their registration elsewhere.
The first district covers 37 barangays and the second district 61 barangays, eight of which are island barangays.
The city’s list of voters was cleansed after the holding of the barangay special election on November 25, 2013.
The standoff last year between members of the Moro National Liberation Front loyal to founding chair Nur Misuari and government forced the Comelec to postpone the barangay polls from Oct. 30 to Nov. 25.
The standoff started Sept. 9 after hundreds of MNLF members infiltrated some coastal barangays in this city. (MindaNews)