Registration for absentee voting to start in Nov.

Beginning next month, the Philippine Consulate General will resume the registration and certification of qualified overseas absentee voters to allow them to vote during the May 13, 2013, Philippine national elections.

The registration and certification will be conducted from Nov. 2, 2011, until Oct. 31, 2012, during regular office days from 8am to 6pm.

The Consulate will also conduct the registration and certification during the One-Saturday or Sunday-A-Month service. This year, it will be on Nov. 19 and Dec. 18, from 9am to 4pm.

Those who may register are all qualified Filipino citizens who intend to vote abroad or who will be abroad on election day; Filipino citizens who will be turning 18 years old on or before the day of the election; dual citizens who have reacquired or retained their Philippine citizenship under the Citizenship Retention and Reacquisition Act of 2003; and immigrants or permanent residents who execute an Affidavit of Intent to Return upon filing of an application for registration as overseas absentee voter.

Registration requirements for overseas absentee voting are a valid Philippine passport and an accomplished OAV Form No. 1, which can be obtained at the Consulate or downloaded and printed from the Commission on Election website, www.comelec.gov.ph/.

For dual citizens who do not possess Philippine passports, requirements include an Order of Approval to retain or reacquire Filipino citizenship and the original or certified true copy of their Oath of Allegiance.

Filipinos in the CNMI who have previously registered and voted in the previous elections are also asked to personally appear at the Consulate office at the fifth floor of Marianas Business Plaza to verify whether their names are already included in the National Registry of Overseas Absentee Voters and the biometrics have been captured.

Those who have already registered, whose names are already on the list of registered voters in the Consulate, and whose biometrics have been captured do not need to register again. Those who are already in the list of registered voters but the biometrics have not been captured, applicants need to fill out the OAV Form No. 1 and have their biometrics captured.

In an interview yesterday, Consul General Medardo Macaraig said that while they will start the absentee voting registration on Nov. 2, their efforts to urge qualified voters to register will be only be on “full blast” next year because of the “unique situation” in the CNMI where majority of Filipinos are currently more concerned about the implementation of the CNMI-only transitional worker final rule.

“We were already given a budget to even bring the registration to Filipinos on Tinian and Rota through our mobile consular services but we deem it a waste of money because we know that not a lot of them will register given the situation. In principle, our request to move the mobile services next year has been approved,” he told Saipan Tribune.

During the last absentee voting registration held from February to August 2009, Macaraig said the Consulate recorded a total of 7,169 registered absentee voters. The initial count was at 7,171 but the Consulate found out that two names were duplicated.

Of the 7,169 absentee voters, only 3,341 voted during the May 2010 Philippine election.

“We have to check again our list of absentee voters through the registration process,” said Macaraig.