By Marie Tonette Grace Marticio
Tacloban City –Sixty-nine winning candidates in the Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) election in Eastern Visayas are facing disqualification or suspension of proclamation for failing to meet the age requirement for SK candidates.
Commission on Elections (Comelec) Regional Director Jose Nick Mendros said the poll body issued an order on May 15 suspending the proclamation of the elected SK officials or, if they have been proclaimed, to put the proclamation on hold.
SK officials must not be more than 24 years old at the time they are elected.
“All of them have already received the order. The effect of this is that they will not be proclaimed or they cannot take their oath if they have already been proclaimed,” Mendros said.
Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) Regional Director Marivel Sacendoncillo said 266 out of 4,390 barangays in the region have incomplete SK officials.
Sacendoncillo said she has not received any guidelines on how to fill in the vacant positions.
“Our options are not yet clear, but we may be ordered to conduct special election; the President may appoint through the DILG (Department of the Interior and Local Government), or may also authorize the chief executives to appoint officials to vacant SK positions,” she said.
The winning candidates will undergo mandatory training until May 26 in 11 partner local resource institutions region-wide to develop their competence in performing their duties as SK officials.
Sacendoncillo elected SK officials who do not attend the training without any valid reason could face disqualification.