Right or Obligation: Suffrage

Voting is a right vested on people under a democratic country. The citizens have the right to choose their leaders. According to the Philippine Constitution, all the citizens may vote unless disqualified by law. One must also be eighteen years of age and has been residing in the Philippines for at least a year and at least six months in the place they plan to vote preceding the election. If all these were followed, voting will not be a problem.

For years now, people have been manually voting. Early on, the government wanted to improve the system by employing PCOS machines. For many, this has not helped the voting system in the Philippines at all. Instead, it has created a lot of issues. In 2013, President Aquino signed RA 10367. Again, this raised a lot of questions and contentions between party-lists and the government.

“No Bio, No Boto” was launched by the COMELEC. This angered a lot of citizens. Most felt that this is unconstitutional and a certain party-list even filed for a temporary restraining order. The reason for the commotion is, all previously registered voters without biometrics will have to subject themselves to biometrics capture. If they do not, then they cannot vote. A strict compliance to the requirement was promulgated. They felt this was an added requirement violating the constitutional provision.

Embracing a change is very difficult for a lot of people. This would mean getting out of your comfort zones. This was probably what most of the citizens felt that is why they strongly opposed the “No Bio, No Boto” system. I admire the dedication the citizens of this country have just to be able to vote. I have personally witnessed how they tried to comply. I was one with the many who registered late and had to line up early in the morning and finish the whole process in the afternoon. This only means that people really want to vote and exercise their rights. But a little discomfort now will not hurt if in the future, it will make the system more easy and efficient.

The people’s complaints are mainly because the effort they have to exert when they have been comfortable with the outdated way of voting. Manual registration and voting is nearly passé. I know a lot of people getting away with double registration or fly-voting or even voting on behalf of other people who cannot vote. The government, on its part wants to regulate and make the system easy to avoid any untoward events. Truly, having to go through the biometrics capture is an added requirement for voters. But this is a one-time requirement. Once you have had your information captured, it will be stored in the database for future use.

I regret that I have been irresponsible when it comes to exercising my right to suffrage. I felt the guilt of not having the same dedication others have. I registered late while others have registered on time. While I have all the valid reasons in the world why I was not able to comply early on, I believe others had their own reasons too. But since I knew I was somehow at fault, I had to embrace the change that the government want to effect to ease the long process in the long run. Other groups who continue to oppose this will just have to accept and see the good side of the “No Bio, No Boto” campaign. This will instill discipline to each one of us. It just goes to say, if there is a will, there is a way. Their dedication must equal their efforts. If they strongly want to vote, then they must do whatever it takes for them to qualify to the requirements. COMELEC came up with other solutions like setting up satellite offices in malls.

For now, suffrage is still a right that we citizens of this country may enjoy but at the same time we have to comply with the requirements. We may feel obliged because of the requirements, but these will surely benefit us all in the future.