Comelec expects to register 6 million voters in the Barangay and SK registration starting on Friday

FILE PHOTO: Voters registration (Photo: Avito C.Dalan / PNA)

MANILA—The Commission on Elections (Comelec) is looking to register six million new voters during the 16-day voter registration period for the 2016 Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) elections.

Comelec Spokesman James Jimenez said that two million regular-aged voters and four million youths are expected to register during the registration period, which will start on Friday, July 15.

“That is not a hard target though. Those are just the numbers on how many we expect to apply for registration. But in practice, they may not all sign up,” he said.

Filipinos who are aged 18 years old and above may register for the village polls, while those that are 15 to 30 years old are set to vote for the youth elections.

Those set to vote for both Barangay and SK leaders, or those aged 18 to 30 years old, are set to be extracted from the Voters’ Registration System (VRS).

There were 54,363,844 registered voters in the May 2016 national and local polls.

Meanwhile, Jimenez said that the upcoming registration will be able to take out flying voters since the process would capture their biometrics data.

“The cleansing of the voters’ list will be done through biometrics,” he explained.

Comelec Resolution No. 10148 said that all registration records found to be double/multiple by the Automated Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS) will be taken out after undergoing due process.

Applicants for voter registration have until July 30 to personally file their applications in their respective city/municipal Offices for Election Officers (OEOs) daily during office hours.