WATCHDOG. The Diocesan Electoral Board (DEB) of the Diocese of Dumaguete, headed by Msgr. Julius Perpetuo Heruela (left), is calling for strict measures against nuisance bets. Shown here on Friday (July 21, 2023) with the priest were DEB executive director Fred Magallano, and Emilie Capito, who will facilitate a two-day strategic planning seminar/workshop on Saturday and Sunday. (Photo by Judy Flores Partlow)
DUMAGUETE CITY – The Diocesan Electoral Board (DEB) of the Diocese of Dumaguete calls for stricter measures to weed out nuisance candidates as the Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan Elections (BSKE) draw near.
Msgr. Julius Perpetuo S. Heruela, DEB convenor, and Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting (PPCRV) board member on Friday said strategic planning and seminar-workshop on Saturday and Sunday will help the DEB review its policies and directions as a “volunteer election watchdog”.
“We want to put in writing what we have been doing, particularly on volunteerism, and define or improve our role in every election as a citizen’s arm of the Comelec (Commission on Elections),” Heruela said.
Heruela also said the DEB is strongly supporting the move of Comelec chair George Erwin Garcia to “criminalize” nuisance candidates.
He noted that in the 2022 elections, Comelec “failed to act immediately” on the complaint by the late Gov. Roel Degamo to have another candidate using a similar-sounding name as his, to be declared a nuisance.
The man who filed his Certificate of Candidacy as Ruel Degamo garnered enough votes that later were transferred to Roel after a tedious legal battle.
Degamo was then declared the governor of Negros Oriental, unseating proclaimed election winner Pryde Henry Teves, after the nuisance candidate’s votes were counted in his favor.
The DEB has partnered with the Comelec, the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), the Philippine National Police (PNP), and the Department of Education (DepEd), in every electoral exercise for more than two decades.
It undertakes activities that complement the Comelec’s efforts, such as voters’ education, deployment of volunteers to the polling centers, and monitoring and reporting of election-related activities and incidents to ensure clean, honest, peaceful, and orderly elections, Heruela said.
He also emphasized the need to educate the people against vote-buying, considering there are new ways to do this with the advent of digital technology. (PNA)
