The Commission on Elections (Comelec) is looking to complete the printing of the more than two million official ballots for the September 14 Bangsamoro Parliamentary Elections (BPE) in one to two weeks.
“We can finish printing the 2.3 million ballots in one to two weeks,” Comelec chairperson George Garcia said in a press briefing during the Kick-off Ceremony for the printing of the official BPE ballots at the National Printing Office in Quezon City on Thursday.
“However, the ballot verification process takes a bit longer, as they have to be verified one by one. That part will take us to about three weeks,” added the poll body chief.
Around 2,393,202 official ballots are set to be printed at the NPO with a budget of PHP63 million.
Garcia noted that the first to be printed are ballots for the farthest places.
“We will prioritize the ones for Tawi-Tawi. We will begin with the ballots of the farthest island,” he said.
Garcia said there will be no excess ballots to be printed for the September polls to prevent allegations of fraud on Election Day.
“There will be no excess ballots. It is strictly a one-to-one ratio,” he said.
“There is the issue of where the excess ballots are being used. If there are 5,212 precincts and each has three excess ballots, that amounts to 15,000 ballots. We don’t want any suspicion arising regarding where those excess ballots end up,” he added. (PNA)