'I'd rather do it manually'

Nation's new digital voting system breeds distrust among overseas Filipino workers, writes Jan Cusco

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A new online voting system aimed at boosting turnout among the Philippines' millions of overseas workers ahead of Monday's mid-term elections has been marked by confusion and fears of disenfranchisement.

Thousands of overseas Filipino workers, or OFWs, have already cast their ballots in the race dominated by a bitter feud between President Ferdinand Marcos and his impeached vice president Sara Duterte.

While official turnout figures are not yet publicly available, data from the Commission on Elections (Comelec) show at least 134,000 of the 1.22 million registered overseas voters have signed up for the new online system, which opened April 13.

But Jun Burlasa III, a Filipino working in Singapore, says he will not vote again if he has to do it online.

"I'd rather do it manually," the 50-year-old told AFP this week, describing the new system as "confusing and suspicious".

At issue is a digital QR code generated after voting that leads users to a page asking them to verify their ballot has been submitted correctly. Below that is a box containing a jumble of computer code and candidate names.