Comelec’s Garcia says overseas ballot sans Robredo’s name ‘fake news’

Commission on Elections (Comelec) Commissioner George Garcia on Sunday rebuffed reports that presidential candidate Vice President Leni Robredo’s name was omitted in one of the ballots for the overseas absentee voting.

According to GMA News’ Tina Panganiban-Perez, Garcia explained that New Zealand uses only one template for its 2022 elections ballots and it is serialized, so such claims could be considered “fake news.”

“Fake news everywhere. Dami na namin referral sa NBI. One template lang sa New Zealand and serialized so kung may walang candidate, ‘di lang isa ang lalabas. [There are] at least 1,000 ballots for a batch of ballot ID no,” he said.

(There are fake news everywhere. We have a lot of referrals to the NBI. There is just one template in New Zealand and it is serialized so if there is one candidate missing, not only one ballot will come out. There are at least 1000 ballots for a batch of ballot ID numbers.)

The Comelec earlier established the Task Force Kontra Fake News to combat disinformation and counter any attempt to undermine the credibility of the electoral process.

Garcia himself is the chair of this task force.

The overseas voting for the 2022 polls started on April 10 and will end until May 9, or Election Day in the Philippines. — BM, GMA News