‘Printing of ballots for barangay elections on track’

MANILA, Philippines - The digital printing of ballots for the Oct. 28 barangay polls would likely be completed by the end of the month, ahead of the Oct. 18 target, the Commission on Elections (Comelec) announced yesterday.

“Almost 60 percent of the 54 million ballots have already been printed, so printing may be completed this month.  Every day, the National Printing Office (NPO) is able to print up to two million ballots,” Comelec Commissioner Grace Padaca said after Comelec officials toured members of the media at the NPO yesterday.

According to the NPO, approximately 33,167,000 ballots for the barangay elections have been printed from Sept. 4 to 20. The ballot requirement is 54,051,626.

Comelec Commissioner Lui Guia said that digital printing method is also being used to produce other election paraphernalia such as election returns, certificates of canvass and statements of votes.

NPO Deputy Director Raul Nagrampa said the election documents are being printed by two of the three Canon Color Stream 3000 machines that were used in the May 13 polls.

“This is the first time that this (digital printing) is being done in a manual election. So printing is really fast. We are going to have 170,603 polling precincts for the barangay elections,” Guia said in the press briefing.

The poll body, however, has deferred the printing of the ballots for the Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) elections pending the decision of Congress on whether the SK polls would push through or not, said Comelec Commissioner Christian Robert Lim.

“We are waiting for the final word on SK.  It will take only three to four days to print the ballots,” Lim added.

There are around five million registered voters for SK elections, which cover the age bracket of 15 to 17.

The NPO has finished printing the ballots for war-torn Zamboanga City. But the Comelec would decide if the elections in the city should push through after a command conference with the Philippine National Police and Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) on Monday.

In Pampanga, the provincial police are preparing security plans for the elections. – With Ric Sapnu