A Filipino community leader in Riyadh immediately reacted to my story in Arab News. Francis Oca sent me an e-mail and said:

". . . voting by mail for absentee voters in May will definitely exclude overseas Filipinos based in Saudi Arabia . . . where the postal system are considered not so reliable." Commissioner Florentino Tuazon, chair of the Committee on Overseas Absentee Voting at the Comelec, said that "this was the recommendation of the post", meaning the Philippine embassy and consular officials in the Kingdom.

If that statement is true, I wonder what the basis was for those officials to say that the postal system in the Kingdom is unreliable.

During the twenty years that I have lived and worked in this beautiful country, I have not lost a single mail; and my mails always arrive on time. I believe it is totally incorrect, baseless, and an insult to our host country, for somebody new to this place to conclude and issue such a sweeping statement.

The picture shows then Philippine Ambassador to Saudi Arabia Bahnarim Guinomla casting his vote in the basement of the Philippine embassy in Riyadh.