Guanzon backs call to slow printing of barangay, SK ballots

Commissioner Rowena Guanzon (PNA Photo)

MANILA — Commission on Elections (Comelec) Commissioner Rowena Guanzon on Tuesday supported the call of Citizens’ Battle Against Corruption (CIBAC) party-list Rep.Sherwin Tugna, chair of the House Committee on Suffrage and Electoral Reforms, for the poll body to go slow in the printing of the ballots.

She noted that funds will go to waste once the barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) polls are postponed.

“Gov’t funds for ballots will go to waste if elections are postponed. I agree with Cong. Tugna that @COMELEC should slow down on the printing,” said the poll body official in her Twitter account, @commrguanzon.

On the other hand, Comelec Spokesperson James Jimenez reported that some 15,000 official ballots have already been printed since the printing started last August 9.

“As of August 11, we have printed the barangay and SK ballots for Batanes of 15,021 pieces,” he said.

This number can be broken down into 11,101 ballots for barangay and 3,920 ballots for SK.

The poll body will be printing 77,261,086 ballots to be used in the October 23 polls. They are looking to finish the printing in 35 days.

After printing the ballots for Batanes, next to be printed are for the provinces in Eastern Visayas.

Each ballot costs PHP3 for a total budget of PHP231.6 million. (PNA)