Overseas voting bill to be passed before 2013 polls, solon says

Akbayan Representative Walden Bello. PHOTO TAKEN FROM FACEBOOK.COM

MANILA, Philippines — Akbayan Representative Walden Bello on Thursday said that he was confident the proposed measure for overseas voting would be passed before the midterm elections next year.

In a statement, Bello said that the Overseas Voting Bill was “a few steps away from being passed into law.” The bill was passed on second reading by the House of Representatives earlier this week.

Bello assured Filipinos abroad that amendments to the proposed measure would breeze through its third reading. He was also positive that the bill would be approved once it reached the Senate.

If passed, the partylist lawmaker said that the measure would be considered “a major success for the Filipino people across the world.”

Under the said legislation, Filipinos living abroad will be able to participate in the national elections. Bello said that the term “absentee” would not be a qualifier for Filipinos living overseas “to remove the unnecessary distinction between Filipinos residing in the Philippines and outside the Philippines and emphasize that Filipinos, regardless of their location, have equal rights in determining the leaders of the country.”

“The right to vote must be made available for every Filipino, wherever she may be in the world,” stressed Bello, the principal author of the measure.