Santiago blames low ratings on married name

Senator Miriam Defensor-Santiago is very much in the race this May election. But people might not find her in the list of senatorial candidates if they will look for “Santiago” come election day.


The re-electionist senator’s name is listed instead as Defensor-Santiago in the special paper ballot that the Commission on Election (Comelec) will use in the country’s first-ever full automated election.

Saying that other married female candidates might find themselves in the same predicament, Santiago urged the Comelec to educate voters on the use of maiden names of married candidates like her.

Santiago lamented that her lower ranking in the recent senatorial survey of Pulse Asia could be because people are looking for her surname, not her maiden name.

The poll body should take “affirmative action” by educating voters that some female candidates like her have chosen to be listed under their maiden name, followed by their married name.

In the past elections, the voters write the name of candidates in the ballot. This time, however, the voters will simply shade the circles beside the name of the candidates. An electronic machine will automatically read and count the shaded circles.

And as the world celebrates the women’s month this March, the senator invoked the constitutional provision that: “The State shall ensure the fundamental equality before the law of men and women.”

Since women constitute one-half of the population, Santiago said women should make up one-half of the Senate and of the House of Representatives, and one-half of the 15-member justices in the Supreme Court.

As a gender-sensitive country, the senator said, the Philippines should also have a female Senate President, a female Speaker, and a female Chief Justice.


In a recent gathering of some 5,000 barangay (village) leaders at the Ynares Center in Antipolo City, Santiago joked that the fundamental right of married women was to be loved by their husbands.


“But when you are told to love your neighbor, this does not mean that a man should love all the women in his barangay,” Santiago said, sending the crowd into gales of laughter.