Comelec set to review VRIS project

The Commission on Elections (Comelec) announced yesterday it was conducting a formal review of the Voter’s Registration and Identification System (VRIS) on Aug. 20 to finally decide the fate of the cancelled poll modernization project.

Chairman Alfredo Benipayo said all the Comelec commissioners would be meeting with representatives of project bid winner Photokina Marketing Corp. and its foreign partners.

"We have scheduled the meeting in the afternoon of the 20th. We want to know what they (Photokina) have to say," Benipayo said.

Comelec Commissioner Resurreccion Borra said the meeting with Photokina would be an official en banc meeting.

"It’s not a personal meeting with the chairman. The Photokina people are going to make a presentation to the en banc, so we can see once and for all what the VRIS is all about," Borra said.

He said there was a chance the fate of the project could be decided with finality in the said meeting. Last month, the consortium submitted a document pertinent to the poll modernization project.

George Balagatas, Photokina senior vice president for corporate affairs, said the meeting with the Comelec was welcome development.

"This will give us the opportunity to provide the chairman and the commissioners all the answers raised about the VRIS," Balagtas said.

"Hopefully, this will signal the resumption of the much-delayed implementation of the VRIS so that it can be put in place in time for the 2004 elections."

Essentially, VRIS provides a comprehensive and integrated solution for voter registration including the development and maintenance of a secure electoral database that would serve as the foundation for clean and honest elections.

A secure, tamper-proof voter ID card that will serve as tangible proof of the clean voters’ list shall be issued only to duly validated registered voters.

The Photokina consortium was awarded the P1.2-billion project following one of the most exhaustive and highly technical bidding procedures ever conducted by the Comelec. It bested the field by garnering the highest technical score and submitting the lowest price, outbidding its closest rival by more than P500 million.

However, former Comelec chairwoman Harriet Demetriou, prior to the end of her term in January, cancelled the project because it allegedly incorporated an additional P700 million for its implementation.

The VRIS Project Team, made up by Photokina Marketing Corp., Polaroid, Unisys, Headstrong, US-based IBM and French security company Sagem, said it complied with all the rules and won the bidding fairly.