Signal jammers a waste of time

CEBU, Philippines - The Commission on Elections-7 is advising those who are attempting to use signal jammers to disrupt the May 13 elections not to bother with their plan as it will just be a waste of time as these will only delay, not change, election results.

National Telecommunications Commission-7 Regional Director Jesus Laureno presented to members of the Regional Joint Security Control Center the signal jammer they seized last month during a routine inspection in a store along Manalili St., Cebu City.

He said that they have been intensifying their inspections since the last election when the issue of signal jammers was raised after the shift to automated elections from manual elections.

Laureno explained that a signal jammer, depending on its range, can block the signal of one cell site.  Small signal jammers can bar signals within 10 to 20 meters while bigger range jammers can block signals within kilometers. One signal jamming device can cost P15,000 to P20,000.

He cautioned that the signal jammers look like an ordinary wireless router but these have more than one antenna.

NTC Commissioner Gamaliel Cordoba earlier said in a press conference in Manila that these devices are regarded as smuggled since they have not issued any permit for signal jammers to be sold in the country.

Vendors of signal jamming devices will be fined while those caught using the device face two years in prison for violating NTC regulations and another 12 years for violating Comelec rules.

Comelec-7 Regional Director Temie Lambino said that they are not worried about the presence of jamming devices in the region since it would just hamper or block the signal of the Precinct Count Optical Scan machines but will not affect the result of the election.

“Magsasayang lang sila ng panahon,” he said.

If in case the signal of a PCOS machine is jammed, Lambino said they still have the Broadband Global Area Network and the Very Small Aperture Satellite options. They can also resort to manual transmission.

Meanwhile, with the coming May 13 election considered as a critical time for energy supply to be sufficient, the Visayas Electric Company is asking the public to refrain from flying kites on this day, considering the increase number of outages in Cebu so far caused by tangled kites.

According to the records of VECO, kite entanglement cases since the start of the year have been on the rise.

Last March, VECO removed 252 entangled kites in their electrical wires which have caused 18 outages and a combined total of 47 hours of power lost. Last month, VECO removed 236 entangled kites consequently causing 31 outages for a collated 87 hours of power lost.

According to Theresa Sederiosa, corporate communications manager of VECO, most of the entangled-kites they responded to that caused outages were in Cebu City specifically in Talamban, Labangon, and Pardo as well as Talisay city, Mandaue, Consolacion, Liloan, Minglanilla, Naga City and San Fernando. —/BRP (FREEMAN)