MANILA – The Commission on Elections (Comelec) on Monday announced it is temporarily stopping the printing of ballots for the 2016 Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) polls.

The Comelec announcement comes after President Rodrigo Duterte openly expressed his desire to postpone the elections, considering that drug money may be used to fund the campaigns of those running for barangay posts.

“If there is still no law, or a joint resolution from Congress on the postponement by September 1, we will resume the printing,” Comelec Printing Committee head, Atty Genevieve Guevarra said in a statement.

The Comelec has started the printing of the ballots for barangay elections on August 21, while the ballots for the SK polls is slated to begin on September 1.

Each ballot costs P3.00 from the initial price of P3.80 as priced by the National Printing Office, Comelec said.

The poll body is expecting to shell out at least P255-million for the printing of 85 million ballots for the elections scheduled on October 31.

Duterte backs postponing barangay, SK elections