THE Commission on Elections said Wednesday it plans to postpone the Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan elections to a later date to avoid “election fatigue” in the country.
Comelec Chairman Andres Bautista said it was not practical for the poll body to hold another voting exercise in October given that the national and local elections had just ended.
“We have this so-called election fatigue. We don’t want to have too many elections in the country,” Bautista said.
Although he had no any idea when it would be best to hold the Barangay and SK elections, Bautista said, they would ask the House of Representatives and the Senate to consider deferring them.
“We will suggest that, maybe, it is better that we postpone it,” Bautista said.
He also said it would be “costly” for them to conduct a manual election in over 420,000 villages in the country.
“Aside from fatigue, holding elections is expensive, and mainly because we have to pay more teachers who will serve as Board of Election Tellers,” Bautista said.
The barangay and youth elections are set to take place less than six months after the May 9 national and local elections.