Comelec: 60% of ballots for May midterm polls already printed

MANILA, Philippines — More than 38 million ballots for the upcoming midterm elections in May 2019 have already been printed, the Commission on Elections (Comelec) said on Wednesday.

The poll body, citing data from the Printing Committee, said 38,347,754 ballots, have been printed as of Tuesday, March 19.

This, according to Comelec, equates to 60.24 percent of the 63,662,481 ballots to be printed.

The poll body added that the remaining ballots that need to be printed are for the Ilocos, Cagayan and the National Capital Region.

On the other hand, Comelec Spokesperson James Jimenez said the ballot printing may finish before the start of the Holy Week, which was earlier than the poll body’s initial target date of April 25.

Comelec said the National Printing Office cranked up its printing of ballots on February 20, with an average of 1 million ballots printed each day.

Comelec earlier said that there are 61,843,750 registered voters for the midterm polls.  /muf