Comelec to recycle ballots if Oct. 23 village polls won’t push through

Bautista is open to the plan to conduct the village and youth polls on May 2018. (PNA PHOTO)

MANILA, Aug. 10— The Commission on Elections (Comelec) is planning to recycle the official ballots that already been printed in the event Congress has decided to postpone the October polls to next year.

Comelec Chairman Juan Andres Bautista noted that they have two options on how they will reuse the official ballots, which the poll body started printing on Wednesday.

“One is we pass a resolution saying the date indicated (in the ballots) is valid for future elections,” he said.

The poll chief added: “Another is we can also use snopake (correction fluid) the ballots to change the dates. The only problem there is it will incur additional expenses.”

On August 9, the Comelec began printing the over 77 million official ballots to be used in the barangay and SK elections at the National Printing Office (NPO).

They are hoping to complete the printing of ballots in just 35 days.

On the other hand, Bautista is open to the plan to conduct the village and youth polls on May 2018.

“We will respect whatever will be their decision regarding this matter. We have always been neutral. Our only appeal is for them not to make it too close to the next elections,” he said.

“For us, it should have an interval of at least one year. So this proposal of May 2018, we are okay with it since we have one year (interval),” the Comelec chief added.

He is reacting to the decision of the House of Representatives to move the village and youth polls to May 2018 instead of holding it on October 23.