By LEILANIE ADRIANO
LAOAG CITY— The Commission on Elections sees the low turnout in last month’s special voters registration for persons with disabilities (PWDs) in the Ilocos region as a “good sign.”
“You have (few) PWDs. Ibig sabihin malulusog po ang mga Ilocano… Kaya ang bilang ng mga may kapansanan dito a kokonti (This means that Ilocanos are healthy. That is why there are very few PWDs here),” Commissioner Rene Sarmiento said when he visited Ilocos Norte on Friday.
Special registrations were held all over Luzon last month. But Comelec records for Ilocos Norte and Pangasinan show that many of the scheduled registrations in the two provinces generated from zero to very low turnout. Data for Ilocos Sur and La Union are not yet available.
The region is composed of the provinces of Ilocos Norte and Sur, La Union and Pangasinan, and has a total of 2.6 million voters as of last elections out of a population of more than just 4.5 million. Pangasinan is one of the five provinces nationwide with the highest number of voters in the country.
