House panel OKs committee report on 2022 barangay, SK polls postponement

The House suffrage and electoral reforms panel on Thursday approved its committee report on the postponement of the December 5, 2022 barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) polls.

A total of 14 lawmakers voted for the approval of the report which contains the substitute bill and sets the date of the next barangay and SK election to the first Monday of December 2023.

Only Kabataan party-list Representative Raoul Manuel opposed the measure, but he did not cast his vote and instead submitted a dissenting opinion.

The substitute bill will be sent to the House appropriations committee.

At least 38 lawmakers have filed a bill postponing the 2022 barangay and SK polls, arguing that the P8 billion budget for holding the election will be better used to help the country recover from the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Commission on Elections earlier said that postponing the barangay and SK polls will mean additional expenses amounting to P5 billion since registration for new voters will have to be opened again.

But on Thursday, Mountain Province Rep. Maximo Dalog, House suffrage and electoral reforms panel chair, said the postponement of the barangay and SK polls will allow more Filipinos to register as voters and give the government time to apply corrective actions on the honoraria of poll workers whose remunerations are still subject to taxes.

Manuel said postponing the polls is anti-democratic and will hamper efficient governance and services for pandemic recovery.

"Policy improvement is bleak if there is no incentive like an election to compel leaders to listen to constituents and do better. If we prolong the terms of office of those incompetent and corrupt leaders, we are effectively dooming our fellow citizens to a longer time of unresponsive and inefficient local delivery of basic social services," he said in a dissenting opinion which will be attached to the committee report.

"Postponement, for whatever reasons forwarded by its proponents, is antithetical to the democratic right of every Filipino to choose their own leaders. If ordinary Filipinos are able to regularly choose their leaders from the national level down to the municipal or city level, then why should they be deprived to regularly choose leaders at the grassroots level at which they can actually feel basic governmental services?" he added.

On Tuesday, the Senate electoral reforms committee conducted a hearing on bills seeking the postponement of barangay and SK elections filed by Senators Jinggoy Estrda and Francis Escudero.

Senator Imee Marcos, committee chair, said she is against the proposal but is leaving the final decision up to the panel.

Since 2016, the barangay and SK polls have been repeatedly postponed.

The October 2016 barangay and SK polls were postponed to October 2017. From there, it was postponed to May 2018, which was again reset to December 2022.—AOL, GMA News