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Bacolod City, Philippines Tuesday, October 30, 2012
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Police step up security
at registration of voters
BY
CARLA GOMEZ

The Philippine National Police sent more policemen yesterday to secure offices of the Commission on Elections in the towns and cities of Negros Occidental as the number of people registering to vote kept growing.

The deadline for registering to vote is 3 p.m. tomorrow, Negros Occidental Elections Supervisor Jessie Suarez said.

In Bacolod City, people began lining up to register to vote at 4 a.m. yesterday and, by mid-morning, the line of those waiting to get into the Bacolod Arts and Youth Sports Center where the COMELEC has set up its registration center, was from the Bacolod Christian Center up to the Bac-Up 1 Office at San Juan Street.

Bacolod Election Officer Mavil Majarucon-Sia said they were able to accommodate only about 650 registrants yesterday while about 600 more in line were told to return today.

They only have three voter registration machines at the BAYS Center and she is trying to borrow more from other COMELEC offices that are not as busy as those in Bacolod, Sia said.

She said they could accommodate more who want to register to vote if they can get additional machines, noting that about 70 percent of those lining up to register are young people.

A voter registration machine is a desktop computer, with a digital camera, fingerprint scanner and a signature pad attached to it that enables the capture of a voter’s biometrics

The registration of voters began in May last year but it was only in September when the number of registrants picked up, Sia said. In September they were getting about 300 registrants a day but by last week they reached 600 to 650 a day, while yesterday, more than a thousand turned out, she said.

She reminded those lining up to register to vote to bring valid identification cards with them.

Suarez said the COMELEC has asked the police to augment security forces at voter registration areas with the registrants increasing as the deadline nears.

At the rate the registration is going, Negros Occidental voters could reach 1.5 million, Suarez said.

There are reports that many of those registering to vote are being hauled in by politicians in some areas of the province.

Senior Supt. Ricardo de la Paz, Bacolod police superintendent, said he assigned an additional team of policemen to the BAYS Center to assist the COMELEC.

Senior Supt. Milko Lirazan, Negros Occidental Police Provincial Office head, said policemen were also being augmented at COMELEC offices in towns and cities throughout the province.*CPG

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