Comelec not anticipating looming BARMM polls postponement

Comelec Chairman George Erwin Garcia during the press briefing at the poll body’s central office in Intramuros Manila, on September 28, 2024. INQUIRER.net / NOY MORCOSO

MANILA, Philippines — The Commission on Elections (Comelec) is not anticipating the looming postponement of the first Bangsamoro polls, its chairman George Erwin Garcia said on Wednesday.

Garcia made the comment after President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. certified as urgent the bill seeking the postponement of the first election in Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) to October.

READ: PCO confirms Marcos is seeking BARMM poll postponement to Oct

Before this, the BARMM polls should be done in concurrence with the May 12 midterm elections.

“We thought all along that the parliamentary elections will push through,” Garcia told reporters in a Viber message.

“Because of these recent developments, we did not yet proceed with the printing of the BARMM parliamentary ballots,” he added. “Only the national and local elections ballots.”

On Monday, the Comelec resumed the printing of ballots after being delayed repeatedly due to last-minute adjustments brought about by Supreme Court (SC) rulings

The printing of over six million ballots worth P132 million began on Jan. 6, but the Comelec had to discard these because the SC reversed the Comelec’s ruling declaring several senatorial bets as nuisance candidates.

It includes the 2.3 million ballots for BARMM polls, but Garcia said this had to be discarded too due to issues in serialization.

READ: Comelec eyeing to save 2.3 million BARRM polls ballots

The Bangsamoro Organic Law mandates that the BARMM parliament should have 80 seats.

However, only 65 seats are up for grabs, with 109 aspirants filing their certificates of candidacy (COC).

Of the 65, 25 are allotted for parliamentary district representatives. The 40 are reserved for regional parliamentary political parties, which is similar to the party-list system.

Eight of the seats are for sectoral groups, which shall be elected in their convention or assembly separate from the parliamentary polls.

The seven remaining seats were supposed to be for Sulu, which is no longer part of BARMM.

Should the BARMM polls get postponed, Garcia said the Comelec has to conduct COC filing for new aspirants.

“We may end up opening the filing of candidacy anew for the region in the event of redistricting as a result of reapportionment of the slots originally assigned to Sulu,” Garcia said.