[Ask Your Comelec] What campaign materials can be taken down?

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Every week since the campaign period started, local election office workers have been going around to take down tarpaulins and posters

MANILA, Philippines – Many voters complain that campaign tarpaulins and posters plastered randomly are unsightly. Yet there are those who also doubt the determination of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) to take down illegal campaign materials and pursue those responsible for them. 

Well, the Comelec is serious. Every week since the campaign period started, local election office workers have been going around to conduct two types of “baklas” (takedown or dismantling): one, to clean up areas; two, to remove paraphernalia that violate rules, with the view of filing complaints against unheeding candidates and campaign staff or volunteers. 

Director Frances Arabe leads the poll body’s national Task Force Baklas, and fills us in on the often overlooked or misunderstood basics of why dismantling illegal campaign posters is necessary, what is considered illegal to begin with, what different rules apply to public and private areas bearing these posters, what due process is accorded to those who break the rules, and how concerned voters can report violations they observe. 

Watch Ask Your Comelec, anchored by Rappler managing editor Miriam Grace Go, on Friday, April 25, at 6 pm. – Rappler.com