Abalos wants SK law repealed, says winners too young to hold office

The law that paved the way for the Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) elections should be repealed by Congress since its winners are not qualified to hold public office, Commission on Elections (Comelec) Chairman Benjamin Abalos said yesterday.

“I think we have to revisit the SK law, because they are just between 15 to 17 years old. They’re too young to occupy these positions. They can’t even enter into a contract and yet there they are occupying a public office,” Abalos told lawmakers during yesterday’s budget hearing at the House of Representatives.

Abalos also said there are “valid and overriding reasons” why the SK elections, along with the barangay polls on Oct. 29, should be deferred.

“(Because) we are pitting families against each other,” Abalos said as he defended Comelec’s P8.6-billion budget for 2008.

Abalos stressed the wounds caused by last May’s bitterly contested elections are just starting to heal.

Another reason why the elections this October should be deferred is its cost, Abalos said.

The poll chief pointed out that P2.1 billion has been allocated for the barangay and SK elections for Oct. 29, just five months after the hotly contested May 14 elections.

“It’s expenditures. We will spend again in this (October’s) political exercise, just after we did in the last May elections,” Abalos said.

“The deferment of the elections will have no loss on the part of the government. Whatever paraphernalia we have purchased could still be used for the next elections,” he said.

Should the scheduled polls next month be postponed, Abalos told congressmen that “more than half” of the P2.1 billion will remain with the Comelec.

The amount could be well spent to construct a new building for the Comelec after its main office was struck by fire last April.

Early this month, some 149 congressmen voted to reset the elections to the second Monday of May in 2009. Fifty other lawmakers, however, opposed the move while four abstained.

The Senate also rejected the proposal and wanted the elections to push through.

The House’s decision to postpone the October elections was based on Comelec’s recommendation, which assured the congressmen that they can hold the elections at any given time.

But if poll automation is the primary concern, Comelec said it would take them two years to implement it.

Makati Rep. Teddyboy Locsin, who heads the House committee on suffrage and electoral reforms, said it was their “unanimous” decision to postpone the elections, as per endorsement of Comelec Commissioner Florentino Tuason as their resource person.