The Philippine Postal Corporation (Philpost) has strongly denied allegations made by Commission on Elections (Comelec) Chairman Jose Melo that it is charging P56 million as warehouse fee for the transport of millions of ballots for the May 10 automated elections.

Postmaster General Hector Villanueva said Melo’s statement was misleading and put Philpost in bad light as the public may think that the agency abused its privilege.

According to Villanueva, Philpost serves only as a bodega (warehouse) or repository of Comelec chattels charging very minimal amount. Villanueva also reiterated that Philpost is not contracted by Comelec to transport ballots from the National Printing Office in Quezon City to the Foreign Surface Mail Distribution Center in Port Area, the Philpost center in charge of warehousing.

Melo’s misleading statement was published in one widely circulated broadsheet quoted in saying that “the overall cost of transporting the ballots to Philpost, at P56 million, is too high. The Comelec is looking for a cheaper warehouse near the NPO plant, fearing that it will not have enough space to store the large volume of printed ballots.”

“PhilPost has no knowledge who benefited from the P56 million hauling contract. Our role here is just a safe keeper of ballots, nothing more, nothing less. In fact, PhilPost has been offering additional logistics and warehousing service at very competitive rates which Comelec has studiously sidelined for reasons beyond our comprehension,” Villanueva added.