By Ferdinand Patinio | Philippine News Agency
The Commission on Elections (Comelec) is set to proclaim the 12 winning senators on Saturday, five days after the May 12 midterm elections.
In a press briefing on Friday, Comelec Chairperson George Garcia said the proclamation is scheduled at the Tent City of the Manila Hotel at 3:00 p.m.
“We are just waiting for the formal recommendation of the supervisory committee. We were informed they will recommend the proclamation of 12 winning senatorial candidates based on yesterday’s (Thursday) ranking. We will have the proclamation by 3:00 p.m. tomorrow (Saturday),” the Comelec chair said.
Garcia said each member of the Commission en banc will be given the chance to proclaim the winning senators starting from 12th place down to the one who got the highest votes,”Each commissioner will be reading the certificate of proclamation of each and every candidate.”
Each senator-elect is allowed to bring along 10 to 15 guests and are given five minutes each to deliver their speeches.
“We will start distributing the invitations to the winning senatorial candidates. And maybe 10 to 15 guests will be allowed to each winning senatorial candidate. This is more compared to the past. It used to be only five. This is their moment,” Garcia said.
On the other hand, the Comelec is looking at proclaiming the winning party-list groups on May 19.
“We will come up with [a] resolution regarding allocation of seats for the party-list. That will be read in the proclamation of the party-list this coming Monday,” Garcia said.
The Commission en banc, sitting as the National Board of Canvassers, completed the canvassing of all 175 certificates of canvass, both local and overseas, on Thursday.
