Black Silhouette

Looking back December 22, 1997, marks and signals the ratification of the law specifically "AN ACT AUTHORIZING THE COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS TO USE AN AUTOMATED ELECTION SYSTEM IN THE MAY 11, 1998 NATIONAL OR LOCAL ELECTIONS AND IN SUBSEQUENT NATIONAL AND LOCAL ELECTORAL EXERCISES, PROVIDING FUNDS THEREFOR AND FOR OTHER PURPOSES."

However, this law was not implemented for two reasons. One the requirement that the counting machine to be used must be an “optical scanning/mark-sense reading device” unduly limited the technology to be used. Two, the Supreme Court scrapped the billion-peso automated election contract awarded to Mega Pacific Consortium due to anomalous bidding, rendering the counting machines useless. Consequently, the May 2004 elections were done manually, from the voting to the canvassing of the results. Gordon recalls that the process “was slow, tedious, and subject to criticism since the security of the electoral process and its capacity to preserve the sanctity of the ballot and the will of the electorate was put to question.”

But, an amendment was made that blow-up the Filipino people, “AN ACT AMENDING REPUBLIC ACT NO. 8436, ENTITLED "AN ACT AUTHORIZING THE COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS TO USE AN AUTOMATED ELECTION SYSTEM IN THE MAY 11, 1998 NATIONAL OR LOCAL ELECTIONS AND IN SUBSEQUENT NATIONAL AND LOCAL ELECTORAL EXERCISES, TO ENCOURAGE TRANSPARENCY, CREDIBILITY, FAIRNESS AND ACCURACY OF ELECTIONS, AMENDING FOR THE PURPOSE BATAS PAMPANSA BLG. 881, AS AMENDED, REPUBLIC ACT NO. 7166 AND OTHER RELATED ELECTIONS LAWS, PROVIDING FUNDS THEREFOR AND FOR OTHER PURPOSES". Some of the provisions of R.A 8436 were expunged and amended and it was ratified last January 23, 2007, now the Filipino people will surely vote electronically.

that it “sends a strong signal that the Philippines stands firm in protecting and safeguarding the sacred votes of its people.” The House of Representatives had passed its own bill the previous evening. There was no joint bicameral committee to reconcile the House and Senate bills. Since there were no conflicting provisions between the two bills, the House passed on third and final reading the P11.3-billion supplemental budget. Now there is no reason for the COMELEC not to implement a fully automated election in 2010. Gordon must be commended for his dogged determination, his persistence and commitment to have the law passed.

In his privilege speech before the Senate, Gordon said the Automated Election System (AES) proposed uses “appropriate technology for voting, counting, consolidating, canvassing, transmission of election results, and other processes in the conduct of electoral exercises.”

AES also assures electronic transmission of electoral results from the precinct level to Congress, the various board of canvassers, the parties, the accredited citizens’ arm, and the media. “This prevents wholesale cheating because tampering with the Certificates of Canvass will no longer be possible. The election returns and certificates of canvass transmitted electronically and digitally signed shall be considered as official election results and shall be used as basis for the proclamation of a candidate.”

Winning bidder for the 2010 election automation project

SMARTMATIC INTERNATIONAL CORP./TOTAL INFORMATION MANAGEMENT CORP. (Smartmatic/TIM) is one of seven bidders for the 2010 election automation project.

About Smartmatic/TIM

Smartmatic International Corp. (Smartmatic) is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Smartmatic International Holding, BV, a company organized under the laws of The Netherlands. Smartmatic has organized elections using its electronic voting solutions in Latin America, the Carribean, the United States, and Asia.

Total Information Management Corporation (TIM) is a domestic corporation registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission in 1981. The corporation is engaged in the business of information technology and service provider.

The two corporations entered into a joint venture on April 23, 2009.

In jeopardy

The automation project was put in jeopardy after TIM announced last Monday that it was withdrawing from its deal with Smartmatic. TIM had dragged in signing the incorporation documents to be registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission.The incorporation of the joint venture

is one prerequisite before the Comelec enters into a contract with Smartmatic and TIM. The documents are required by the Comelec as proof of the joint venture’s legal personality for the contract signing.

TIM, which would have a majority or 60 percent stake in the venture, had wanted more control in the financial and technical aspect of the automation project. TIM officials had alleged that despite Smartmatic’s minority, or only 40 percent, stake in the venture, the foreign partner would

have more control over the partnership’s affairs.

Without the proper check and balance, the groundwork for a possible electronic fraud is laid out, TIM sources said.

Smartmatic had insisted that the core issue is money. Lawyers of Smartmatic told Makati Rep. Teodoro Locsin that TIM’s Antuñez had demanded P500 million from Smartmatic.

TIM had denied the allegation.

But as far as the poll body is concerned, it was TIM that

was the guilty party. It threatened to file criminal and civil charges against

TIM for backing out of the landmark project.

AUTOMATED ELECTION SYSTEM

According to R.A 9369, Automated election system (AES) is a system using appropriate technology which has been demonstrated in the voting, counting, consolidating, canvassing, and transmission of election result, and other electoral process. It is primarily made to ensure free, orderly, honest,

peaceful, credible and informed elections, plebiscites, referenda, recall and other similar electoral exercises by improving on the election process and adopting systems, which shall involved the use of an automated election system that will ensure the secrecy and sanctity of the ballot and all election, consolidation and transmission documents on order that the process shall be transparent and credible and that the results shall be fast, accurate and reflective of the genuine will of the people.

Many people screaming for “CHANGE” and I think automated election are one of the stepping-stones towards absolute change. Partly, it has a good outcome in the upcoming 2010 elections. Somehow it will reduce the guns, goons, and gold during the said event. In principle, election automation will

remove the potential for human error/cheating from the ballot review and ballot counting. It can give near instant feedback of the election results. As soon as voting closes, it should be technically possible to get the election results within an hour.

Some of its advantages are as follows:

2. Remove the delay and potential for cheating between ballot tallying and preparation of election returns

4. Make elections much cheaper to execute

Conversely, it will also lead to some disadvantages such as:

2. Labor will no longer be needed for several days/weeks to manage and monitor elections. The resulting creative destruction will affect teachers, poll-watchers, men of arms, media people, advertising, and the peripheral economy that they patronize during election period.

4. Quick direct from population feedback will become a viable option—referendum questions like charter change can be realistically executed in a short period of time if elections become so cheap and quick to do.

In other words, automating elections in the Philippines will have far-reaching effects. At least if and when the entire country’s elections are automated. Conceivably, less people will need to watch over the process, so that means fewer customers for any nearby vendors or establishments in each area’s election stations.

Most exciting is the prospect of unscrupulous candidates starting to rely on geeks, aside from their goons, to affect the vote. Cheating attempts may actually give more people throughout the country more incentive to learn techie stuff like programming, network management, etc.

Of course, no one wants to see fraudulent elections. But what if Filipinos in the most remote areas of the Philippines suddenly learn computer programming? That’s a possibility, especially if candidates are willing to pay good money for results.

There are Risk Factors

The software used all throughout the process, from ballot reading all the way

to returns tallying, must be open for public scrutiny. It may not be

proprietary and secret.

Ballots and computers used throughout may fail. Backup/contingency plan must

exist and be robust. Sabotage could be the way cheating will be introduced, in

order to force reverting to manual process.

- Transmittal and reporting of results could be susceptible to hacking. Instant

public visibility of results as counted at source and as transmitted at receipt

will mitigate threats of hacking.

Voting needs to be simple and straightforward. Many Filipinos are not computer

literate, and barely literate. PEBKAC errors can lead to many spoiled ballots,

which may either be invalidated like in the US, or can be used as a pretense to

revert to manual.

As an IT student

We can’t deny the fact that we are now living in a digital and high-tech world. Different technologies have invented every now and then which can affect our daily living. It can bring us comfort but sometimes leads to problems.

In my own notion, through automation we can ensure a credible transition of power and have clean, honest and orderly 2010 elections. Moreover, setting up the country's automated electoral system is a crucial step toward clean and honest elections. While it will not be a cure-all for the country's electoral problems, automating the polls will eliminate a lot of the human intervention that has made vote-rigging possible.

I am very optimistic that an automated electoral system will facilitate fair and honest elections, provide a new set of government leaders with an unquestionable authority, and unite the country in facing the challenges ahead of us. The heart of a true democracy lies in achieving clean and honest elections which provide mandate and authority to elect public officials. Our laws mandate the Commission on Elections (COMELEC) to use an automated election system in the conduct of national and local elections to encourage transparency, credibility, fairness and accuracy of elections.

More to the point, the R.A 9369, sec. 4 states that:

Therefore, IT persons are also one of the active-ingredient in the 2010 elections. They take the lead.

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