"Atty. Lydia Pangilinan, provincial election supervisor on Tuesday said that only P1.17 -billion has been allocated for the conduct of 2013 barangay and SK elections.
This according to her is not enough to cover the expenses of barangay elections in the country with more than 40,000 barangays.
The Comelec earlier stated that they need a total of P3.45 billion to conduct the village elections.
With this, Comelec passed Resolution No.9739 mandating all local government units to set aside P10,000 from each clustered precinct to help them defray election expenses.
However, Pangilinan clarified that based on the resolution, every barangay is required to set aside not less than P10,000 for the election but not more than 10 percent of the available general fund.
She also cited Section 50 of the Omnibus Election Code to support the call for the barangay officials to allocate a certain amount for the expenses of the impending elections.
The election supervisor further explained that under the said law, LGUs are obligated to appropriate funds to defray necessary and reasonable expenses of the members of the board of election tellers, board of canvassers and the printing of election forms and procurement of other election paraphernalia and the installation of polling booths.
"Ang Comelec naman po ay nagrere-align ng pondo para sa kakulangan pero kami po sa field ay inatasan nilang mag-collect ng share mula sa bawat barangay," Pangilan stated.
She also noted that they had already coordinated with the municipal treasurers and budget officers to determine the availability of funds.
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