‘Short banc’ may delay preparations for b’gay, SK polls

The three vacant top positions in the Commission on Elections may cause unintentional delays in the preparations for the barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan (SK) elections in May, a Comelec official said yesterday.

In a blog post titled “A Short Banc,” Comelec spokesman James Jimenez said having four remaining commissioners means the Comelec has a “very fragile quorum.”

“The minute one of them becomes unavailable to sit with the others in formal session, the quorum is lost. That can get pretty tricky with the May 2018 barangay and SK elections coming up,” he added.

Commissioners Christian Robert Lim and Arthur Lim retired on Feb. 2, three months after Andres Bautista resigned as chairman on Oct. 1, 2017.

This left Commissioners Rowena Guanzon, Sheriff Abas, Luie Guia and Al Parreño, who was voted acting chairman.

“It is quite possible that this four-member en banc might feel some pressure not to decide on contentious issues,” Jimenez said.

“There is no legal prohibition against such a short en banc acting like a full one, but realpolitik suggests that at some point, someone is going to say ‘shouldn’t we/they just wait for the new chair/commissioners?’ It’s happened before, and I’m not betting against the possibility of such pressure being brought to bear again,” he added.

But Jimenez gave assurance that “a short banc is just as empowered – in all senses – as a full one.”

“The only difference really is that, with a short banc, you can probably expect a little more timorousness, but that’s a problem with people, not with the institution,” he added.