Attachments
1. Context
The Philippines’s susceptibility to hazards such as typhoons, earthquakes and floods has made disaster displacement a constant feature of life in the country. In 2018 alone, some 3.8 million people were newly displaced by disasters.1 At the same time, ongoing conflict and violence in Mindanao’s southern provinces also led some 188,000 people to flee in 2018, joining the estimated 300,000 IDPs awaiting solutions for their conflict-related displacement at the end of 2018.2
Recognizing these displacement challenges, in 2013, the Philippines Commission on Human Rights (CHR) established the Project on Internally Displaced Persons to explore the human-rights implications of displacement.3 Building upon the CHR’s prior collaboration with the Commission on Elections (COMELEC), one component of the CHR’s IDP Project focused on participation in public elections, which have a 75 per cent voter turnout rate.4 Voter registration in the Philippines is tied to a person’s place of residence. Consequently, displacement often impedes IDPs’ ability to exercise their voting rights, particularly when they are living in temporary shelters or transitory areas. A 2015 national workshop on the topic, co-hosted by CHR and COMELEC, both independent, constitutionally-mandated bodies, identified a number of key challenges impacting IDPs’ electoral rights, including damaged voting centres, residency requirements to transfer voter registration, and difficulty accessing their designated polling stations due to distance or insecurity.5 Given the large annual numbers of displacement and the potential for extended displacement, the need to protect IDPs’ voting rights remains a key concern in the Philippines.