Catbaloganons voted YES in cityhood plebiscite

By NINFA B. QUIRANTE (PIA Samar)
June 18, 2007

CATBALOGAN, Samar  –  The YES votes have it! So Catbalogan City now it is!

A YES vote prevailed in the 263 voting precincts in Catbalogan as the counting folded up past midnight of June 16 at the Catbalogan Sangguniang Bayan Hall.

Officials from the DepEd and Comelec declared the ratification of the Catbalogan cityhood through a plebiscite which some 26,765 Catbaloganons participated out of the 48,540 total registered voters.

The YES votes totaled 25,426 (95%) with a measly 1,339 (5%) voters in the negative.

“Voters turn out was an impressive 55% for a plebiscite like this. Voters usually do not participate well in this kind of exercise. We can thus say that the result was the majority will of the people not just a mere plurality”, said Comelec Samar Provincial supervisor Salvador Cruz.

A ten-minute fireworks greeted the announcement, with the LGU officials in a festive mood!

In remote Barangay Bangon, accessible only through a trail-trek for some two hours from Barangay San Vicente, no one voted NO. Chairman of the BEI Alfredo Lontes said that the 127 voters all answered YES to the Question whether they approve the conversion of Catbalogan to a city.

The villagers believe that a road opening will result in the conversion of Catbalogan into a city.

Although an overwhelming YES votes prevailed, there were also NO votes the biggest of which numbered 24 in a precinct.

Earlier, Catbalogan Mayor Coefredo ‘Tekwa’ Uy felt confident that the 57 barangays in Catbalogan will approve the conversion citing the fiscal gains the town could have once declared a city.

There are four other towns that participated in the Saturday plebiscite nationwide, Ms. Ester Villaflor-Rojas, a COMELEC official who was assigned in Catbalogan for the plebiscite duration said. This included, Bogo, Cebu; Baybay, Leyte; San Juan in Metro Manila and Catbalogan, Samar.

Borongan, meanwhile in Eastern Samar is set to conduct a plebiscite for the same purpose come June 20, 2007.