Canvassing of votes for senators, party-list groups – 2022 PH elections

The National Board of Canvassers (NBOC) will proclaim the 12 winning senatorial candidates at 4 pm on Wednesday, May 18, at the Philippine International Convention Center in Pasay City.

The winners will be proclaimed in alphabetical order, not based on their ranking, as the NBOC is still waiting for the complete electronic transmission of election returns from Lanao del Sur, where one town is set to hold a special election on May 24.

“The oversight committee, together with the supervisory committee as well as the other working committees, already made the computation that these remaining votes yet to be transmitted will not affect the Magic 12. The standing might be affected, but not the winning senators,” Comelec spokesman Rex Laudiangco said. 

Each winning senatorial candidate is allowed to bring five companions to the proclamation ceremonies. The cap is placed to ensure compliance with health protocols.

It’s the eighth day since the Commission on Elections convened as the National Board of Canvassers (NBOC). At the end of Day 7, 159 out of 173 certificates of canvass have been tallied for the senatorial and party-list races.

Today, the NBOC will formally count the votes from six overseas posts (Mexico, Prague, Abuja, Tehran, Nairobi, Hong Kong), and the 63 barangays from the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao. 

Only one out of the 26 certificates of canvass (COC) from overseas has yet to be transmitted as of Friday, May 13, the Commission on Elections (Comelec) said. 

“Only the Hong Kong [office] (constituting Hong Kong, Macau, and mainland China) remains to be transmitted, due to the postponement of elections in Shanghai, China on account of the COVID-19 lockdown,” Comelec spokesman Rex Laudiangco said. “The Comelec en banc is studying the possibility of giving authority for Hong Kong special board of canvassers (SBOC) to manually submit the COC, minus Shanghai.”

The poll body, however, committed to still conduct a special election in Shanghai, so that the 1,991 registered voters there will not be disenfranchised.

The National Board of Canvassers (NBOC) is tallying a total of 173 certificates of canvass (COC) for the senatorial and party-list races. Here is the breakdown:

• 133 COCs electronically transmitted (81 from provincial BOCs, 25 from city BOCs, 26 from overseas voting BOCs, 1 from district BOC)
• 40 COCs manually prepared (37 from overseas voting, 1 from the committee on local absentee voting, 1 from special BOC for the 63 barangays in Bangsamoro, 1 from the committee on persons deprived of liberty)

The National Board of Canvassers approved the correction sheets for the votes in the posts of Vietnam, Cambodia, and Austria, after minor discrepancies were detected during the canvassing.

Commission on Elections Commissioner George Garcia explained the error was due to the manual encoding of the votes or transfer of results from the statement of votes to the certificates of canvass. 

The embassies, candidates, and party-list groups affected were:

• Philippine embassy in Phnom Penh: Party-list group Magsasaka garnered 21 votes but COC listed only 2 votes
• Philippine embassy in Hanoi: Party-list group Cancer garnered 3 votes but COC listed 4 votes
• Philippine embassy in Vienna: Senatorial candidate Ariel Lim garnered 24 votes but COC listed only 14 votes

Below are the partial, official results of senatorial and party-list races as of Thursday, May 12, based on 121 certificates of canvass out of 173. 

Votes for the party-list and senatorial races of 50.8 million Filipinos have already been officially counted by the National Board of Canvassers as of Thursday night, May 12, the Commission on Elections said.

The poll body, sitting as NBOC, has formally tallied 121 out of 173 certificates of canvass.