The limits of voter education

IN a little more than a month’s time, Filipino voters will again troop to polling places to select their representatives in government. The candidates, even before the official campaign period started, have fanned themselves out in the hustings, megaphones in hand — figuratively and literally speaking, all in an effort to try and catch everybody’s attention. All of them, especially those who are doing well in the surveys, are expected to contend for a podium finish.

Up for grabs are 12 seats in the Senate, around 300 seats in the House of Representatives (including 59 for party-list representatives), around 1,720 for governors or mayors, and over 16,000 for members of local legislative bodies.