Raffle for party-list slots in 2013 ballots moved to Jan. 4

Commission on Elections Chairman Sixto Brillantes. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines—The Commission on Elections (Comelec) has re-set its scheduled raffle for the placement of party-list groups in the May 2013 elections ballots to January 4.

“We have moved the raffle to determine the order of listing in the ballots of party-list groups from Dec. 17, 2012 to Jan. 4, 2013 at 1:30 pm,” poll chief Sixto Brillantes Jr. said in his Twitter account Wednesday.

Next year’s raffle will be the poll body’s first in determining the order of the groups’ listing in the ballots.

In the 2010 elections, the groups were listed alphabetically.

Earlier reports had noted that Commissioner Rene Sarmiento said the poll body must finish ruling on the unresolved cases of party-list groups up for review before proceeding with the raffle.

The poll body has so far approved 84 party-list groups for next year’s polls. It had disqualified about eight incumbent party-list groups and 147 new and existing groups.

Brillantes added the 17 groups who were previously disqualified by the poll body but were granted status quo ante orders by the Supreme Court would be included in the raffle.