DESPITE the project being thwarted in 2016, an official of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) yesterday proposed anew the use of shopping malls as voting venues in the May 2025 midterm polls.
Speaking after recently forging separate partnerships with SM Malls and Robinsons Malls, Elections Commissioner Aimee Ferolino said it may already be time to again explore the possibilities of holding mall voting.
“Now, we are doing voter registration and also the voting experience… By the next elections, I hope it will already be the real voting in malls. I think it is no longer a far-fetched dream,” said Ferolino in front of SM executives.
“Hopefully, come the 2025 elections, we can also think of something else where we can partner (with malls). This partnership has been going on for years, and we are thinking of expanding to other services we can offer to the people,” she added in a different speech before Robinsons officials.
Ferolino made the call as the Comelec renewed separate partnerships with SM Malls and Robinsons Malls for the holding of satellite voter registration activities inside shopping malls.
Back in the 2016 polls, then Comelec chairman Andres Bautista pushed for the mall voting project. But this was thumbed down by the Commission en Banc, in a vote of 4-3, citing provisions of the Omnibus Election Code (OEC).
