Around 47,500 new voters in Alicante Province

Costa Blanca News | Noticia

The electoral census for 2011 was released by the census office on April 1 and it showed that despite the high number of foreign residents living in towns throughout the Costa Blanca, the interest level in the local elections is very low.

In towns where expat voters number more than a thousand the amount of people that have registered their intention to vote is very low.

In Alfaz del Pi for example, there are 9,875 registered foreign residents yet only 2,668 are prepared to vote.

It is much the same in other towns where foreign voter numbers are woefully low.

Alcoy has 1,991 foreign residents but only 200 are going to turn out on voting day, May 22.

One of the major voting number surprises is Torrevvieja which has a foreign population of 35,083 yet only 6,541 are prepared to use their vote to try and push through changes.

This year residents emanating from other EU states as well as those from Norway, Ecuador, Colombia, Chile, Peru, Bolivia, Paraguay, Iceland and New Zealand are all eligible to vote at the local elections but they are excluded from voting at regional and national level.

Those expats that have taken an interest in local politics say that general apathy among foreign residents is to blame for such a low voter turnout. They say that a lack of knowledge about the various political parties and their candidates puts many people off voting.

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