A final warning to the Comelec

In two days time, we will be holding the mid-term elections for 2013. We have spent a great deal of time and effort in giving our readers a ton of information about the Precinct Count Optical Scan (PCOS) that the Comelec has used since the 2010 elections. Because no one cared to seriously check whether the PCOS machines worked perfectly or were misused in that election… today the PCOS machines suffer from credibility problems. This is truly symptomatic of the Philippines that we never seem to fix our problems.

If you want to know why I’ve been harping on the Comelec, it is simply because these people doesn’t really give a damn about the importance of our democratic process. They tell us that the electronic voting system is the best weapon against “dagdag-bawas,” but when IT experts say otherwise, the Comelec resort to name calling. I thought that the Comelec should side with the Filipino people and not be subservient to the powers-that-be?

Mind you, even in this era of Daang Matuwid when we saw the Bureau of Customs (BOC) lose 2,000 containers in Metro Manila and a thousand plus more in Cebu City because of rice smuggling, we cannot look at the Comelec as a “clean-as-a-whistle” government agency. In my book, the Comelec is no different from the BOC or other corrupt gov’t agencies.

Remember how Sen. Cayetano lambasted Comelec Chairman Sixto Brillantes for their purchase of P95,000 beds for the Comelec’s Baguio mansion? As Chairman Brillantes retorted, “It wasn’t overpriced… it was luxurious!” If Brillantes wasn’t the fair-haired boy of President Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III that would have been grounds for impeachment.

No doubt, the Comelec has a history of corruption. Dig out your history books and ask yourself… what triggered the EDSA Revolt of 1986? If you recall, computers in the year 1986 were in its infancy… but back then the Comelec already used or should I say misused them… because during the official count of the Snap Elections of February 1986, the computer programmers helping the Comelec could no longer fathom the cheating at the Philippine International Convention Center (PICC), and so they all walked out of the PICC and went into the streets of EDSA and history was made.

Alas, with the opposition then already drunk with power after the successful removal of the Marcos Dictatorship, nobody looked back at that momentous albeit historic event at the PICC. No one wanted to know who orchestrated that cheating so that investigations could be done and the cheaters inside the Comelec jailed. Indeed, no one gets jailed for anything in this country… especially when they violate our election laws.

Last Tuesday, Chairman Brillantes issued resolution No. 9688 that imposed a “money ban” immediately. That Comelec resolution declared that cash withdrawals more than P100,000 is not allowed so as to prevent “vote-buying”, The Comelec Resolution also “deputized” the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) in order to effect this Comelec order.

In addition to that “Money Ban” order, the Comelec’s checkpoints would now allow operatives to check not just for banned firearms, but for money. Wow, in these days where we don’t know whether the checkpoints are manned by the Police, the AFP or the NPA’s this is creating a highly risky or volatile situation. Thankfully, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BS) issued a statement saying to the effect, that they cannot enforce the Comelec resolution because it is violative of R.A. no.1405 on Secrecy of Peso Deposits and R.A. no.6426 Secrecy of Foreign Currency Deposits.

This only proves to us that aside from being computer illiterate, the Comelec Chairman who is a lawyer is also ignorant of our laws. Remember the old saying, “Ignorance of the law excuses no one?” Unfortunately that includes the Comelec Chairman. Shame on him! You want to discuss the liquor ban? No more please. When we have a Comelec that indiscriminately imposes laws that they themselves know that they can’t enforce them, then they are totally lost. I hope that they have no lost the spirit of the law, and that is to give Juan dela Cruz orderly and above all honest elections. As for the source code review, let’s face it folks, it’s too just too late in the hour for that!

 This is the second time that the Philippines will be holding its electronic voting machine and we must take note that other nations, like France and Germany have already abandoned electronic voting as too “susceptible” to be misused by Information Technology (IT) experts.

So it wasn’t surprising to me when I interviewed Canadian Ambassador Christopher Thornley a few weeks ago and he told me that Canada and the United Kingdom never went into an electronic vote and only used paper and pencil. At this point, if the Comelec truly wants free and honest elections they must allow a parallel manual count… not only to save their faces, but to save our nation’s democratic process. Call this our final warning.

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For email responses to this article, write to vsbobita@mozcom.com or vsbobita@gmail.com. His columns can be accessed through www.philstar.com.