TACLOBAN CITY - The Commission on Elections in Eastern Visayas is all ready for the June 16 plebiscites to be held in the two towns in the region aiming to join the ranks of the country’s cities.

Lawyer Jose Nick Mendros, assistant regional director of the Commission on Elections, said that the two towns have allocated over P3 million each for the conduct of the plebiscites.

“We are now ready for the plebiscites to be conducted in the towns of Baybay and Catbalogan,” Mendros told Leyte Samar Daily Express.

According to him, for the yes votes to win, a simple majority of the votes cast in the plebiscite are enough. He said that the role of the Comelec, through the plebiscite committee members, is to tabulate the result with the Comelec en banc declaring the final result of the plebiscite. The three-member plebiscite committee is equivalent to the board of election inspectors in regular elections.  
   
Mendros said that aside from Baybay and Catbalogan, the town of Borongan in Eastern Samar is also set to conduct its own plebiscite on June 20.

The three towns are bidding to become cities in the hope that they could attract more investments and acquire a bigger share of their Internal Revenue Allotment. But the League of Cities of the Philippines is contesting the conversion of towns into cities saying that this would lessen the IRA shares of cities.

At present, the Eastern Visayas region has four cities, namely, Calbayog in Samar; Maasin in Southern Leyte and Ormoc and Tacloban, both in Leyte.

Baybay Elections Officer Rutche Cerro said that their office conducted a meeting with the town’s 92 barangay leaders for them to inform their respective constituents on the forthcoming plebiscite in the town.

Streamers placed in different strategic places in Baybay were also hung as part of their information drive about the plebiscite, Cerro told Express.   

“We encourage all the registered voters of the town to go out and cast their votes whether they favor or not for Baybay to become a city,” Cerro added.

Out of it’s over 106,000 population, Baybay has 52,015 registered voters with an annual income of P96 million. It is politically considered to be the main bailiwick of the Loreto clan which count Governor Carlos Jericho Petilla and his mother outgoing Rep. Remedios Petilla (1st distr) and aunt Rep. Carmen Cari (5th district) among its members.

Baybay Mayor Jose Cari said that he is looking forward in seeing his town become a city, believing it would help open doors in attracting more investors.

In Catbalogan, Mayor Coefredo Uy had formed a plebiscite advocacy campaign teams which are task to campaign among the town’s 48,483 registered voters to vote for “yes.”

Elizabeth Velasco, a staff of the town mayor, said that Uy is personally heading the campaign for the yes vote to win. “He strongly favors to make Catbalogan a city as this will help us grow economically,” Velasco, in a telephone call, said.

Catbalogan has over 96,000 population with an annual income of P70 million. It is the provincial capital of Samar.