Comelec starts deploying ballots

The Printing of AES ballots for the elections on May 9, 2022, started at 11:27 a.m. on Jan. 23, 2022, at the National Printing Office (NPO). (Photo from the Facebook page of Comelec)

MANILA, Philippines — The Commission on Elections (Comelec) has started deploying ballots to be used for the May 9, 2022 national and local elections as scheduled.

The poll body kicked off the deployment on Tuesday night from its Pasig City warehouse where the ballots printed by the National Printing Office in Quezon City starting last January have been stored.

The ballots will be deployed to the city or municipal treasurer’s offices nationwide, read Comelec’s advisory to stakeholders including the media to observe the activity.

Comelec announced on April 2 it was able to complete the printing of 67,442,616 ballots needed for the May 9 elections. But the printed ballots still have to go through a verification process.

Ballot printing started on Jan. 23 and Comelec targeted to start the deployment of ballots on April 20.

The exact number of ballots were prepared for 65,721,231 local registered voters and 1,697,215 overseas registered voters.

The remaining 24,171 ballots will be for voters in the 63 barangays in North Cotabato who were barred by the Comelec from voting for local positions.

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