By DARLENE CAY
THE Commission on Elections, sitting en banc on Tuesday, scheduled the special barangay elections for Bohol and Zamboanga on November 25.
The poll body earlier announced the suspension of barangay polls in Bohol, which was devastated by a 7.2 magnitude earthquake exactly a week ago. Comelec also suspended elections in Zamboanga City on October 8 due to the standoff between the military and Moro National Liberation Front rebels.
Comelec wants the special elections in the two areas to take place before the end of the month as Republic Act 9164 specifies that the term of the incumbent barangay officials must end on November 30. The nationwide barangay elections will be held on October 28.
“We don’t want a holdover, unless talaga, ‘wag naman mangyari sana, na may mangyari pa ulit na grabe (We don’t want a holdover, unless something bad will happen again–which I hope does not happen),” Comelec chairman Sixto Brillantes Jr. said.
He said they decided to suspend the polls in the entire Bohol province, instead of select barangays, to allow people affected by the tragedy to better cope.
“’Yung trauma ng buong (probinsya) tapos ‘yung continuing aftershocks…It’s affecting the entire province (The trauma of the entire province and the continuing aftershocks…are affecting the entire province),” he said.
The earthquake in central Visayas resulted in the death of 190 people, with 177 in Bohol, and displacement of thousands of people. The damage to property and infrastructure is estimated at over P760 million in the province.
Brillantes also said city engineers are still surveying schools to check if they are still fit to be designated as polling places.
“Sine-survey na ngayon ng engineering office ng probinsya kung anong kailangan. Sila ang magsasabi sa amin kung pwede na ito. Kapag sinabi nilang hindi pwede, maglalagay kami ng makeshift [tents] (The provincial engineering office is already surveying what the province needs. They will be the ones who will tell us if the schools can be used. If they say that they may not, we will put up makeshift tents),” he said.
Comelec plans to place these makeshift tents in school compounds.
(Darlene Cay is a University of the Philippines journalism student writing for VERA Files.)