A total of 139 certificates of canvass (COCs) have already been canvassed by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) en banc which sits as the National Board of Canvassers (NBOC) for the senatorial and partylist elections, it was reported Saturday, May 13.
Comelec acting spokesperson John Rex Laudiangco said the canvassed COCs represent 80.34 percent of the total number of COCs that will be counted by the NBOC.
“We are now at 80.34-percent mark. Kaunting-kaunti na lang po (Only a few more to go),” Laudiangco said in a press briefing.
The canvassed COCs covered 60,658,560 registered voters where around 50.81 million individuals actually cast their votes for a voter turnout of 83.77 percent.
“Almost all the regions are now 100 percent transmitted with the exception of overseas voting. May kulang pa po dyan dahil alam naman po natin ‘yung breakdown mayroong electronically transmitted at mayroong manually submitted (We have yet to complete it because as you know in our breakdown, there are electronically transmitted and manually submitted ),” Laudiangco said.
Out of the 26 COCs that will be electronically submitted from overseas absentee voting (OAV), 25 COCs were already submitted with the exception of Hong Kong. This covers voters from Mainland China, Hong Kong, and Macau.
“Alam niyo naman po ang (You know the) issue, it’s because of the postponement or suspension of elections for Shanghai because of the Covid lockdown there,” Laudiangco explained.
Despite this, the Comelec mouthpiece said they are optimistic that they will sustain the projected voter turnout. The Comelec aims to hit at least 81 percent voter turnout or 56 million votes cast out of the 65.83 million registered voters.
“It’s clear across the region that we have breached the 81-percent voter turnout. It’s really consistent,” Laudiangco said.
For the local absentee voting (LAV), Laudiangco said the Committee had already canvassed 100 percent of the votes and the voter turnout was 88.73 percent – the highest voter turnout for LAV.
The NBOC convened around 3 p.m. and among the expected COCs to be canvassed are those from South Cotabato and Cebu City.