ARMM polls may not be automated – Melo

The planned automation of the Aug. 11 elections in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) might not push through because of time constraints, Commission on Elections (Comelec) Chairman Jose Melo said yesterday.

Melo noted that until now, there is still no bidder declared “successful” to supply the direct recording electronic (DRE) and the optical mark reader (OMR) technologies that the Comelec wants to use to modernize the ARMM polls.

“In any event, if there is no successful bidder, what’s the consequence? The consequence is we cannot computerize the August elections in ARMM,” he added.

The Comelec earlier held a bidding for DRE but only one supplier had qualified in the eligibility requirements, while the applications for bids for OMR were accepted by the agency only last April 1.

To automate the ARMM polls, Melo claimed they have to move back the elections in November or even later. 

“But in order to move or to postpone the elections, you need congressional action. That’s very difficult,” he said.

Melo said the Comelec is set to consult the Advisory Council on Poll Automation to determine if the lone bid submitted for DRE “can be considered as satisfactory as a successful bid.”

He added that after this, they would meet with the joint congressional oversight group led by Sen. Richard Gordon to inform it about the council’s decision.

But Melo maintained that even if the council declares the lone bid as a successful bid, the Comelec is already “running out of time” to automate the ARMM polls.

DRE is a voting machine in which a voter is presented with a screen showing all the names of the candidates, much like the locator screens in shopping malls.

To cast his vote, the voter has to key in the name of the candidate of his choice on the screen, and his vote automatically gets counted.

The OMR, on the other hand, is a ballot-counting machine wherein a voter is given a ballot with pre-printed candidates’ names, with corresponding ovals to shade or broken arrows to connect. The votes in the shaded ballots will then be scanned using an OMR.

Under the plan, DRE will be used in Maguindanao, and the OMR in the rest of the region.

The Comelec will then decide which technology can be used in the 2010 national elections.