Preparing for May 2010 Elections: An electoral checklist

There are so many possible scenarios that can happen between now and the May 2010 elections. One scenario is for elections to proceed as scheduled, another is NOEL (no elections), yet another is failure of elections. While survey results show that our people are skeptical about clean and honest elections, most assume that May 2010 elections will take place.

Let us discuss the first scenario for this issue. If elections were to proceed as scheduled in May, are we ready for this? How prepared are our people to select the candidates of their own free choice? How prepared are those in charge of elections for an orderly, clean, honest elections? How prepared are the political parties for ensuring a credible, genuinely free and honest electoral process?

First, let us start to list some pre-May preparations that are needed. We all need to group together to make a complete checklist if we want to ensure clean, honest, free elections.

Have our voters determined and confirmed if their names have been included in the voters’ list? Have they checked if all the information about them needed for them to be allowed to vote are correctly and completely inputted? Have the voters also been informed about their registration venues and what they are expected to do inside the polling areas?

Given that it will be the first time to have a computerized ballot system in May, have the voters been given ample information about this new computerized voting scheme?

Have the polling places been secured, stable electrical power and back-up checked and double-checked? Have the personnel and staff for each polling place and for each of the electoral procedures been identified and properly verified in terms of their integrity and honesty and in terms of their knowledge and preparedness for their electoral tasks?

Can Comelec be compelled to publish the list of people in-charge of what electoral task in what place for the May elections? Has Comelec finalized and prepared the lists of voters per polling area? Have they prepared tamper-free electoral ballots and computers and the honest, skilled personnel to manage this country’s first-ever computerized elections?

Have Comelec and the private election-watch organizations gone through the list of possible violations and areas/sources of cheating and other electoral anomalies. More importantly, have the government and private election-related groups set up security and safety nets to ensure a clean, honest elections?

Polling places in the Philippines have been characterized as crowded, disorderly, unsystematic in the past, a number even utterly dangerous and deadly. Too many people are seen to be searching and checking if their names are included in that polling place’s voter’s list. There are also too many people who are in the area of the polling place who should not be allowed in the vicinity. A more systematic procedure should be mapped out as early as now to ensure the smooth but, more importantly, the free, honest exercise of each and every Filipino’s sacred right to vote.

If Comelec really stands for clean and honest elections, given decades of electoral experiences, they should, by now, be more vigilant and be more systematic in addressing previously acknowledged problem areas and procedures. It is also everyone’s responsibility to prepare and to ensure a real honest and free electoral process.

Are we all preparing and vigilantly organizing to ensure clean and honest May elections? Please send us your suggestions of other items to be included in an electoral checklist to ensure a genuinely clean and honest electoral process?

(To be continued)

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