Namfrel: We declined accreditation to test verifiability of precinct counts vs transmissions
MANILA, Philippines — Poll watchdog National Citizens’ Movement for Free Elections issued a clarification on why it declined accreditation of the Commission on Elections as the citizen's arm for the May 13 elections.
In its manifestation filed before the Comelec, Namfrel noted that the poll body declined to grant their request to open access data.
"Namfrel declined the accreditation because in Namfrel's view it is now time to test the verifiability of the separately provided precinct counts against subsequent transmissions and aggregations," the watchdog said in a statement.
Namfrel pointed out that in the 2016 elections, it was not able to express an opinion on the statistical validity of the random manual audit and on the integrity of the aggregation of the count as there was no visibility on precinct data.
Access to transmission logs and aggregated data from the fourth server, which was revealed late, in the 2016 polls would have made the RMA robust, according to Namfrel.
The election watchdog also dismissed suggestions that it has plans of doing something else with requesting open election data.
"Election data are voluminous and are usually presented in the aggregate. The underlying data or basis such as returns, certificates of canvass, transmission logs, tracking of data movements are not visible and in any case are not expressed in a manner that is readable by an ordinary voter," Namfrel said.
Due to the lack of visibility on the counting and transmission process of votes in the past three automated polls, there have been concerns on manipulation of elections, it added.
A website that would present the data relatable to the public would produce transparency and provide additional credibility to the elections, the election watchdog said.
The poll body, however, refused to grant Namfrel access to the main server data.
"Nevertheless, Namfrel remains open to assisting the Comelec as a citizens' arm, should a meaningful opportunity arise," Namfrel said.
The Comelec, on the other hand, said there was no need to replace Namfrel after it declined its accreditation as the citizen arm for the 2019 elections.
“There is no policy statement on that yet but if the Comelec goes into the direction of finding a Namfrel equivalent, I’m pretty sure a lot of organizations are willing to step up,” Comelec spokesman James Jimenez earlier said. — Patricia Lourdes Viray
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