Overseas Filipino Workers started voting for next President

Taiwan News – Filipinos abroad started voting on Saturday for the country’s next president, a monthlong period that leads up to the national balloting.

The Philippine embassies and consulates in Hong Kong and Singapore will use automatic counting machines, which will be deployed nationwide for the first time in a general election.

Just a little over half a million have registered for the overseas absentee voting, a small fraction of the estimated 9 million Filipinos working abroad who help keep the economy afloat by remitting billions of dollars yearly.

Overseas voters can elect the president, vice president, 12 senators and choose one of over 100 parties representing marginalized groups.

Voters in the country also will elect members of the House of Representatives, provincial, city and town officials during the national balloting on May 10.

The automated election system will be put to the test on Sunday, the day Filipinos working in Hong Kong mostly as domestic helpers will be off from work, Tita De Villa, head of the election watchdog Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting, told ABS-CBN television in Manila. (source)