Comelec starts the printing of ballots for the Barangay, SK polls

MANILA -- The Commission on Elections (Comelec) started on Sunday the printing of 85 million ballots to be used in the Oct. 31, 2016 Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) polls.With this, Comelec Chairman Juan Andres Bautista said the printing has commenced at the National Printing Office (NPO) in Quezon City despite uncertainties on whether or not the scheduled polls will push through. The long and short of it is we must follow the law, whatever the law may be. Right now, the law says we must have an election on Oct. 31. As long as there is no law that postpones it, we don’t have a choice but to implement the law,” he said.He added, And because there is no law yet, and as it is, there are only 70 days before the elections, we are left with no choice but to start printing the ballots already. The poll body chief explained that of the 85 million ballots, 57 million will be for voters in the Barangay and 28 million are for the SK. The ballots to be printed will have a size of 4½” by 8” each. We are allotting 60 days for the printing. Hopefully, we will finish by Oct. 21,” said Bautista.On the other hand, Comelec–Printing Committee head Genevieve Guevarra said that the process will not be in full swing after being directed to slow down in terms of printing the official ballots, since there is a possibility of the polls being postponed by Congress. The instruction to us is not to go full speed with the printing because there are several bills for the postponement. What we want to avoid is we already have millions printed, then it will just be postponed,” she said.Bautista said that they are hoping to know the fate of the October elections in the next 10 days. I would hope that by the end of August, they already have a decision on whether it will be postponed or not. Once we get a word that the law postponing it will be passed, we will stop with the preparations already,” he added.Guevarra said it would be late if they will start on full speed with the ballot printing next month. We will run out of time even if we go 1.9 to 2 million ballots (per day) if we don’t start in September,” she said.Last week, Senator Alan Peter Cayetano filed a bill seeking the postponement of the Barangay and SK polls and instead hold it to the last Monday of October 2018.Likewise, the majority coalition in the House of Representatives has agreed to postpone the Oct. 31 elections. (PNA)