100,000 defective ballots ‘very small percentage’ of needed 67M — Comelec

Commission on Elections spokesperson James Jimenez. INQUIRER.net file photo / Ryan Leagogo

MANILA, Philippines — The around 100,000 defective ballots are just a very small percentage of 67 million ballots needed for the May 9 polls, Commission on Elections (Comelec) spokesperson James Jimenez said Tuesday.

Comelec Commissioner George Garcia recently said that 105,853 ballots, considered defective, will be burned soon. 

“Itong bilang ng defective ballots natin so far, sa pagkakaintindi ko, ay pasok pa ito sa margin of error ng mga ganitong klaseng projects,” Jimenez said in a Laging Handa public briefing.

(The number of defective ballots so far, to my understanding, is within the margin of error for these kinds of projects.)

“Malaking project po kasi ‘to [This is a big project]. We’re looking at 67 million ballots, 67 million tapos ang (and the) defective mo nasa (are around) 100,000, that’s a very small percentage,” he added.

Garcia explained that the defects include different cuts, sizes, color, and presence of smudges.

He added that the poll body is targeting to finish the ballot printing by the second week of April, including the ballots that will replace the defective ones.

To date, the Comelec has printed 55,579,298 ballots or 82.4 percent of the total needed ballots.

Reclassification of ballots

Meanwhile, Jimenez noted that the reclassification of ballots is “very reliable.”

Garcia previously said that around two million printed ballots, initially tagged as defective, were reclassified as good ballots after rechecking.

Jimenez explained the process of reclassifying ballots.

He said that the printing of ballots comes in batches. For instance, in a batch of 1,000 printed ballots, when they observe a damage in one ballot, the whole batch will be set aside in quarantine. The ballots will then be rechecked one by one.

“Again, kung isa o dalawa lang diyan ang may damage, the rest are considered good. Ibig sabihin ‘yung mga na-reclassify as good, talagang wala namang physical glitch du’n sa balota,” Jimenez elaborated in the same briefing.

(Again, if it is just one or two that have damages, the rest are considered good. It means those reclassified as good have no physical glitch in the ballot.)

“It’s just that napasama sila sa batch na mayroong damage kaya sila na-originally classify as defective,” he continued.

(It’s just that they are included in the batch which has a damage that is why they are originally classified as defective.)

JPV