No to secret voting
The practice of secret balloting is a time-honored electoral practice. It is a process rooted in democracy, and nobody can quarrel with it.In a general election, voters in their precincts fill out their ballots in secret, although they are not beyond telling everybody their preference before or after they have cast their votes. Even those who actively campaigned for a particular candidate or for a particular cause are assured of the right to vote in secret.
There are cases, however, when viva voce, a show of hands or a roll-call vote is truly more democratic and preferred, especially when the circumstances and the personalities require that it be so. This is the case in the election of the Speaker of the House of Representatives.
Congressman Pablo Garcia of Cebu, a self-proclaimed contender for the position, and his allies insist on secret balloting, arguing that such a process is consistent with democratic practices. (“It is the most democratic,” they say.) But they overlook one important fact. They and their colleagues represent a constituency. It would thus be more democratic if they exercised that function in all transparency, with their respective constituents fully informed of the choice they made. They would not propose that they be allowed to vote secretly for or against proposed laws, would they?
We hate to say this, but when Congressman Garcia’s cohorts insist on secret balloting, they open themselves to suspicions that they have made deals behind the scene. In other words, they may have already committed their support to the incumbent, but at the same time may have accepted other “considerations” from the challenges. They just don’t want to be found out. Otherwise, why hide under the mantle of secrecy?
In case the good congressmen had forgotten, open voting has a long and honorable tradition. The Greeks, who were the first to practice democracy (the root word demos and kratos are Greek) three millenniums before our time, elected their leaders by raising their hands. Sometimes they cast lots, but mostly they made their preference known by loudly proclaiming it so.
This method of voting lives on in modern times, in the House of Representatives and, yes, in the Senate. It should be maintained, unless there are valid reasons to change it, and the propensity of politicians to conspire among themselves against the interests of the people who elected them into office is certainly not one of them.
Supporters of Speaker Jose de Venecia Jr. claim that it’s all over but the shouting in the contest for the leadership of the House. For Congressman Garcia’s followers, it is now show-and-tell time. Time to put their money where their mouth is.
If the congressmen are to be worthy of being addressed “honorable,” this is the golden opportunity to let it all hang out, as it were. To stand by their choices, and not through the subterfuge of the secret ballot, please.
The sooner the congressmen elect their leaders through transparent voting, the better for the nation. Then they can move on to carry out the primary task for which they were elected in the first place: to craft meaningful legislation.
