Ombudsman urged to rule on Comelec, Smartmatic cases

MANILA, Philippines – Reform Philippines Coalition (RPC) chairman and independent senatorial candidate Greco Belgica yesterday led the filing of a “citizen’s appeal” urging Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales to resolve the cases against the Commission on Elections (Comelec) and Smartmatic-TIM over the alleged “deliberate disablement of various technical and manual safeguards” in the conduct of the automated elections in 2010 and 2013.

The cases, filed in June 2010 and July 2013 by various groups, were for graft, procurement law violations, violations of the code of conduct and ethical standards for public officials and employees and violations of the automated elections law.

All the cases, Belgica claimed, stemmed from the alleged “disabling of key security features despite the requirement of law for a system for securing the sanctity of the ballot.”

“To ensure that the new electoral system will not be turned into a tool for electronic fraud, the laws provided for technical and manual safeguards… the seeming impunity by which those responsible for the disablement continue to enjoy, make the people feel betrayed, frustrated and desperate,” the letter to Morales read.

Belgica stressed that the safeguards include the mandatory use of digital signatures, conduct of source code review, a voter verified paper audit trail, a ballot verification process using UV mark sensors and a random manual audit. But these were allegedly disabled during the 2010 and 2013 polls.

“To make matters worse, the Comelec and Smartmatic are now poised to repeat in 2016 their highly questionable acts and omissions that characterized the recent automated elections,” the letter also read.

Belgica said the deliberate and repeated disablement of the basic security safeguards of the automated election system cast very serious doubts on the legitimacy of the present national and local government administrations as well as the conduct of any future election.

He asked Morales for a just resolution of the pending cases that would “help prevent the further erosion of public confidence in the electoral system and the government.”