People cash in on poll trash

MANILA, Philippines - Quezon City resident Evangeline Dela Cruz, 33, was hired by a local candidate in Barangay Batasan Hills as a poll watcher. But hours before her scheduled shift at a polling precinct, she was already in the President Corazon Aquino Elementary School collecting leaflets littering the school grounds.

“I’m not ashamed of collecting trash. It’s an additional income for my family,” she told The STAR in Filipino, noting that she will only get P300 for working as a poll watcher.

She said junkshops in the area buy white leaflets, or those made from bond paper, for P8 per kilo. In less than an hour, Dela Cruz already collected a sack full of election paraphernalia.

Dela Cruz was just one of the dozens of residents who flocked to polling centers yesterday to collect and sell leaflets discarded by voters.

At the nearby Commonwealth Elementary School, scavenger Domingo Recites, 50, said he was able to earn P100 in less than two hours of collecting election trash.

Aside from white leaflets, he also collected paraphernalia made from other types of paper, which sell for around P2 to P4 per kilo.