It's final: SK, barangay polls to go manual with P3.2-B budget

The Commission on Elections (Comelec) has decided with finality not to automate the barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) elections because the poll body has a budget of only P3.2 billion for it, a poll official said Friday. "The decision is final. (The Barangay and SK elections won't be) automated because of the cost... P3.2 billion will not suffice for this," Comelec Commissioner Rene Sarmiento told reporters in an interview. He explained that since there are 40,000 barangays, the poll body would also need thousands of voting machines. "(That would just mean) more expenses for the Comelec," he said. The Comelec had allotted P7.2 billion for the automated May polls, with 82,200 Precinct Count Optical Scan (PCOS) machines just on lease to the country. It also supposedly spent P21 million more for the conduct of special elections in some areas in Mindanao. Aside from budget considerations, Sarmiento said there was no need to automate the SK and Barangay elections because there would be no transmission of election results unlike during national elections. But Sarmiento said they are still undecided on whether to use traditional ballots where voters need to write the names of their candidates or ballots where voters just need to shade the oval of their candidate. "(It is still) subject to another meeting (though some say) it should be shading para may continuity," he said. He said they are having a hard time deciding on the matter because if they use ballots that only need to be shaded, they would have to print at least 80,000 different ballot faces because ballots for the Barangay and SK polls would be separate. "This is quite complex, you might miss names in the printing of these ballots," he said, adding that they have already asked the National Printing Office (NPO) to determine whether they will be able to pull this off. The NPO was also the facility that printed the more than 50 million ballots used in the May automated polls. Earlier, the Comelec set the registration periods for the SK elections next month (July 15 to July 25) and the barangay elections in August (1 to 10). A registrant for the SK polls has to be a Filipino citizen, a resident of the barangay for six months, and 15 to 17 years old. A registrant for the barangay polls needs to be a Filipino citizen, a resident of the Philippines for one year, a resident of the barangay for six months, and at least 18 years old. Registrants for both elections need to present IDs during registration. Sarmiento said that they have allotted P160 million for the registration. The SK and barangay elections have been tentatively set on October 25. — RSJ/LBG, GMANews.TV