PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte on Thursday expressed no objection to proposals to postpone the barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan elections for at least a year, citing budget constraints.
“You know, it’s too expensive. You know, the budget preparation is a one year’s work. I only entered in mid-stream, only halfway. I have many problems [to solve],” Duterte said in a press briefing Thursday.
“I don’t have money. I would be saving millions, as these officials would win anyway,” he added.
On Wednesday, Senator Juan Edgardo Angara, who heads the Senate committee on local government, said the barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan elections will likely be postponed following overwhelming support for its deferment from Congress and other sectors.
Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez on Thursday said he supports a joint resolution filed in Congress seeking the postponement of the barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan elections initially scheduled in October.
Alvarez said holding off the elections would be practical.
“I think it’s just practical to postpone the elections because as we know, when there is an election, we cannot appoint or remove people from their posts,” he told reporters.
Several resolutions had been filed in the Lower House calling for the postponement of the village and youth polls slated for October.
Earlier, Citizens Battle Against Corruption (Cibac) party-list Rep. Sherwin Tugna, chairman of the House committee on suffrage and electoral reform admitted that majority of his colleagues in the House of Representatives would want to defer barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan elections.
Tugna said this prompted his panel to conduct a hearing next week to reach a consensus on several proposals to suspend the scheduled Oct. 31, 2016 barangay and SK elections pursuant to Section 1 of Republic Act 9164 as amended by RA 9340.
“During consultations with them, majority of lawmakers said they were in favor of resetting the barangay and SK polls,” Tugna earlier said. “But this is unofficial, we are waiting for the majority to take an official stand on the matter, possibly during a caucus.”
“By next week, we will start our initial deliberation on the matter,” Tugna said.
Bills deferring the twin elections were filed by Senators Angara, Alan Peter Cayetano, Leila de Lima and Joel Villanueva in the Senate, and L-Ray Villafuerte, Emmie Calixto Rubiano in the lower house.
Angara said the prevailing sentiment among stakeholders including local government unit, the National Youth Commission and the Department of the Interior and Local Government is for the deferment of the polls.
The Commission on Elections said the polls should be moved to a later date to avoid “election fatigue” in the country following the May national elections.
Still, Communications Secretary Martin Andanar said the National Printing Office is “ready to start the printing of the 85 million ballots that will be used for the October barangay and SK polls” despite various proposals from Congress to postpone it.
Comelec Chairman Andres Bautista said they are hoping to receive an advisory from Congress whether or not to push with the elections by the end of August so the Comelec can halt the preparations and the money spent would not be wasted.