MANILA, Philippines – Transmission problem has forced the Commission on Elections (Comelec) to defer the proclamation of winning senatorial candidates originally scheduled for Wednesday night.
The Comelec en banc, sitting as the National Board of Canvassers (NBOC), as of Wednesday afternoon received only 20 certificates of canvass (COCs) out of a total of 304.
“We are officially cancelling the scheduled proclamation of the senators tonight (7 p.m. Wednesday). No agreement as yet as to when proclamation will be held. Most probably tomorrow,” Comelec chairman Sixto Brillantes Jr. told reporters in a press conference.
“We don’t want to proclaim now if everything is still hanging,” he said.
Comelec chairman Sixto Brillantes Jr.
Brillantes however said that they can already make a proclamation on the first and second place winners but they don’t want to do proclamations on a piecemeal basis.
“We decided that it would not be good to proclaim two and then it will be piecemeal. We would rather proclaim a good number before we actually proclaim,” he said.
When asked about the slow rate of transmission of results, Brillantes said that they were analyzing the information from the board of canvassers at the provincial, city, and municipal levels.
“We are monitoring everything. What is happening in the provincial board of canvassers, for example, of one province? Why is there no transmission there?” he said.
Is it because there is problem in the province? Or is it because they have not yet received the complete results from the municipal level? This is what we’re making an analysis of so that we can project when we’re going to receive,” Brillantes said.
He however clarified that they don’t have to wait for 100 percent of the COC from all over the country to make a proclamation of some of the winners.
Brillantes pointed out that in the May 2010 automated elections, the proclamation of six senatorial candidates only came after five days from the start of canvassing.
“This is exactly the same as what happened in May 2010. What happened is this: the election was May 10, 2010, the canvassing started immediately, the first proclamation was made five days after on May 15, and only nine were proclaimed,” Brillantes said.
“Five days later the remaining three were proclaimed, so it took a total of eight days to proclaim the 12 senators,” he said.
For this year, Brillantes said that they are targeting the proclamation of 12 senators in five days.