The Commission on Elections (Comelec) on Sunday said it would shut down the social media accounts of senatorial candidates and party-list groups who have not registered when the deadline for the registration of the said social media accounts ended on December 13.
Poll chairman George Garcia said that only 29 of the 66 senatorial candidates and 85 of the 155 party-list groups have complied.
Garcia said he would order these senatorial and party-list groups to delete or remove their unregistered social media accounts to be used for their campaign or face penalty or disqualification changes.
“Because they failed to register. They will lose the opportunity of using the internet for their midterm poll propaganda” he said.
Comelec’s Feb. 7 Resolution No. 25-0167, which was made public on Friday, listed the approved social media accounts and digital campaign platforms of the candidates and parties that were compliant with the poll body’s registration requirement.
Comelec advised the noncompliant national candidates to remove or take down their online content, social media platforms or accounts, otherwise the technology platforms and providers or the concerned law enforcement agency would remove them at the request of its Task Force KKK sa Halalan.
In November last year, the Comelec issued Resolution No. 11064-A requiring social media accounts and pages, websites, podcasts, blogs, vlogs of all candidates and parties to register their accounts with the Education and Information Department (EID) of the poll body.
The candidates and parties were given up to Dec. 13 to register after they filed the certificates of candidacies in early October.
The social media compliant candidates include 10 from the Makabayan coalition, four from the Partido Demokratiko Pilipino-Lakas ng Bayan (PDP-Laban), two from Lakas-Christian Muslim Democrats (Lakas-CMD), one each from Partido Federal ng Pilipinas, Liberal Party, Nacionalista Party, Katipunan ng Nagkakaisang Pilipino, Bunyog Pagkakaisa Party and seven independents.
Poll spokesperson Rex Laudiangco, who is also the Task Force chief and EID head, said there were four senatorial candidates and 12 party list groups that were “partially compliant” with the registration requirements.
