Poll watchdog defends Comelec, automated election system

MANILA, Philippines - An election watchdog has defended the Commission on Elections (Comelec) and the automated election system (AES) amid never-ending allegations hounding the conduct of the last two national polls.

Civil society group Democracy Watch said last Friday that while allegations hounding the conduct of the 2010 and 2013 polls were serious, they still would “need solid proofs.”

Several groups have raised criticisms and allegations against the Comelec and AES during the two previous national elections, including the insinuation that the 2013 polls had been rigged to result in a 60:30:10 winning ratio for President Aquino’s Liberal Party.

But Democracy Watch convenor Ford Wong said that an independent study by experts from the De La Salle University last year has debunked the 60:30:10 theory, citing the law of large numbers.

“It is normal for any system to have flaws, what is important is that it has served its purpose of tabulating results correctly and efficiently without any human intervention,” Wong told reporters in Manila yesterday.

He said the accusers were just “creating their own ghosts to criticize without any basis.”

Wong also noted that while there were minor glitches, the AES has proven to be a better system than manual polls.

He said a good indicator of the success of AES is the lack of system-related election cases in the Senate and House of Representatives. For the Senate there is no pending electoral case, while in the House the pending cases are not even precinct count optical scan (PCOS) related.

“For Democracy Watch, our stand is to further improve any form or brand of automated election system to a high level of reliability and confidence by implementing credible and expanded post-election audit and installing more security features,” he added.

Wong believed that reverting to manual elections is not an option. “Going back to the old ways will bring back the nightmares of election violence, massive cheating and will slide us back to an unstable situation where the legitimacy of elected leaders is in question. This will be a disaster for our country’s democracy and will definitely affect economic stability.”

Still, Wong said there is a need for Comelec to address the criticisms and allegations.

He suggested that the poll body put in place a legal framework should “unacceptable” discrepancies arise from the audit of results.

BIR to asked to probe firm

Meanwhile, Smartmatic-Total Information Management Corp. is urging the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) to look into the tax compliance of rival firm Indra Sistemas, which failed to present a tax clearance certificate when it joined the public bidding for the AES for the 2016 polls.

Ruby Rose Yusi, lead counsel of Smartmatic Philippines, questioned the eligibility of Indra to participate in the two-stage bidding process for a P2.5-billion contract with the Comelec.

Yusi said Indra may not have the legal basis to transact business with Comelec, noting that it failed to appoint a local representative in the bidding for the lease of 23,000 Optical Mark Reader (OMR) units for the forthcoming elections. – With Zinnia dela Peña