High voter turnout seen in Marawi plebiscite

“Our voter turnout is probably around 90, maybe up to 92 percent,” Comelec Chairman George Garcia said. (File Photo: COMELEC/Facebook)

MANILA – The Commission on Elections (Comelec) said 90 percent to 92 percent of voters in two barangays in Marawi City participated in a plebiscite Saturday, which aims to ratify the creation of two more barangays.

“Our voter turnout is probably around 90, maybe up to 92 percent,” Comelec Chairman George Garcia said.

“Nakakatuwa dahil kahit plebisito lang ito sa pag-create ng barangay subalit lahat ng mga taga barangay ay pumunta rito (This is somewhat remarkable because this is just a plebiscite to create a barangay, yet all the villagers came).”

Garcia said if the residents are in favor of splitting their respective barangays, two new villages would be formed: Barangay Boganga II, to be created from the existing Barangay Boganga; and Barangay Datu Dadiligan, to be formed from the existing Barangay Sagonsongan.

About 1,400 voters took part in the referendum.

Barangay Boganga has 992 registered voters out of its population of 6,320 while Barangay Sagonsongan has 480 registered voters out of its population of 7,137.

Garcia noted that so far, they have not received any report of an untoward incident during the poll.

The manual voting started at 7 a.m. and will end at 3 p.m.

The split of the two barangays was proposed to better facilitate the delivery of services to residents displaced by the May 2017 Marawi siege.