Four hundred thirty eight detainees in the province of Bohol have been allowed to fill election ballots and vote for their chosen candidates on May 9, 2016.
Malou Cempron, election assistant II of the Provincial Commission on Elections (Comelec) Office, clarified however that the prisoners will only be allowed to vote for candidates vying for national positions as they are not allowed to participate in the local voting.
Cempron added that out of the 438 inmates who have been cleared to vote, 386 are from the Bohol District Jail (BDJ) and Tagbilaran City Jail (TCJ) while 52 are from the Carmen District Jail.
According to the Comelec’s general instructions, only prisoners who have not been convicted are allowed to vote.
The detainees will cast votes inside their respective prisons but vote counting machines (VCM) will not be used in the process.
Support staff of the Board Election Inspector (BEI) will deliver ballots from precincts to the two three jails where the detainees will place their votes.
Members of the BEI will be heavily guarded by the police.
After the votes are casted, the ballots will be sealed in an envelope and will be delivered by the Special Board Election Inspector together with the support staff and police to the precinct.
The chairman of the BEI will be the one to feed the ballots to the VCM and the receptacle while watchers from various parties will serve as witnesses.
The Comelec chose 18 members of the BEI to man the operations. Among them, 15 will be stationed at the BDJ and TCJ while three will be assigned to the district jail in Carmen.
The number of voting prisoners is already included in the reported 798,768 registered voters in the province.
In the entire Region 7, 6057 detainees have been allowed to vote in the May 9 polls, 5619 are from Cebu while no prisoners were cleared to vote in Siquijor. Â (with reports from Rey Tutas)