Comelec to extend registration hours, add scanners

With four weeks left for voters to register for the May 2016 balloting, the Commission on Elections is planning to extend its service hours and provide extra fingerprint scanners, particularly in Comelec offices with low numbers of people with biometrics data.

At a recent forum, Comelec Chair Andres Bautista said the election body will embark on an all-out campaign to get voters to register given that there were still some 3.1 million voters who had yet to register their biometrics information.

“We are thinking of extending our office hours [and] even provide additional equipment,” Bautista told reporters.

He said areas with poor biometrics registration were in Region IV, National Capital Region and Central Luzon. “We have to develop strategies which will focus on those areas with no or little biometrics registration,” said the Comelec chief.

“Meanwhile, I think it will be better if we call on all voters not to wait until the last minute. From now up to Oct. 11, they should go to their respective Comelec offices or to participating malls and satellite booths [to register],” he said.

The Comelec will temporarily suspend voter registration from Oct. 12 to 16 to give way to the filing of certificates of candidacy.

Bautista earlier said the Comelec had no intention of extending voter registration, which will end on Oct. 31 to avoid derailing preparations for the May 2016 elections.