NPC wants to participate in source code review

MANILA, Philippines — The Nationalist People’s Coalition (NPC) has expressed its intention to participate in the review of the source code for the automated election system (AES) that would be used in the May 2019 midterm polls. 

In its Twitter account @NPCPH, the party said it filed the “necessary request to participate in the local source code review” with the Commission on Elections (Comelec) last Friday.

According to a source at NPC, the party was “one of the active participants” in the local source code review for the 2016 elections.

“This continues and being one of the biggest political parties in the Philippines, it goes to show how involved we are in the political process and it’s not just all talk. We take actions,” the source said.

The source added that taking part in the screening of the source code is an “opportunity to help verify the system.”

“A lot of people complain about the system but they don’t do anything; while at NPC, we really do stuff that’s meaningful,” he maintained. 

As of Wednesday, the Comelec reported that there were 12 applicants, including two political parties and five individuals, who wanted to participate in the source code review. The rest are non-government organizations.

The source code is a set of human readable instructions that dictates how the AES should run. It is composed of numbers, alphabets and symbols.

Comelec accepted applications until Oct. 5 but refused to identify them pending a technical evaluation.

Republic Act 9369 or the poll automation law mandates a review of the source code. It said the Comelec should “promptly make the source code available and open to any interested party or group” which may conduct its own review. 

The review is intended to determine if there are hidden instructions in the source code that may lead to the manipulation of the election results.