MANILA, 8 August — Are Filipino migrant workers willing to pay taxes in exchange for the exercise of their right to vote in Philippine elections?
This question surfaced recently following renewed clamor in the country for Congress to enact an absentee voting law that would allow some six million Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) to vote at their working places in national elections.
The clamor for passage of the absentee voting bill was revived by no less than President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, who declared in her State of the Nation Address last month that an absentee voting bill should be immediately be enacted into law by Congress.
But former Foreign Affairs Secretary Domingo Siazon Jr., now ambassador to Japan, said Congress should also consider if OFWs will be willing to pay taxes to the Philippine government once they are allowed to vote. He noted that OFWs have been given tax exemptions by the government.
“There must be a symbolic payment of taxes,” Siazon said, noting that the additional tax revenue from the OFWs can be used by government in adopting fraud-proof measures, such as using the most modern computers, to secure the sanctity of the Filipino migrant workers’ vote during elections.
Siazon, a veteran diplomat, clarified that he was totally in favor of granting OFWs the right to vote.
His observation was echoed by Undersecretary Merlin Magallona of the DFA’s Office of the Legal Assistant for Migrant Workers Affairs (OLAMWA), who said that lawmakers may repeal the tax exemptions granted to OFWs while enacting a bill on absentee voting.
In an interview with Arab News, Magallona, however, warned that the issue of taxation and the OFWs’ right to vote should be tackled separately by Congress. “My view is taxation should be treated separately (form the absentee voting bill),” he said.
“Citizens should be treated equally in relation to supporting the operations of government. It should not be tacked on that, as a condition to vote, The right to vote is basic in our constitution.” Magallona said. “Of course, there is the view that since you would like to vote, if there is a mechanism to be set up so you could vote, then you should pay taxes so that the government would be more capable to spend for that kind of mechanism. But that is another issue,” Magallona explained.
He also dismissed fears by certain lawmakers that the absentee voting law would be used by unscrupulous administration officials in election fraud. While saying that election fraud will always be a perennial problem in the Philippines, protecting the integrity of the OFWs ballots “is a problem that can be solved; it is not an impossibility.”
“It is the task of Congress to solve this problem,” Magallona, a former dean of the University of the Philippines College of Law said. “That is what they are there for.”
Last Sunday, House Speaker Jose de Venecia told a Filipino audience in Honolulu, Hawaii, that he and Senate President Franklin Drilon will definitely push for the enactment of the absentee voting law.
De Venecia, on a two-day visit to Hawaii, said “overseas Filipinos, especially contract workers, can make a big difference in the choice of our national leaders.”
