Comelec to release transmission logs of 2022 polls 'to erase doubts'
MANILA, Philippines — The Commission on Elections will be releasing copies of transmission logs of votes from last year’s elections to "erase doubts" on the conduct of the last polls.
A hard copy will be provided to Ret. Col. Leonardo Odoño who claimed it is “impossible” that around 20 million votes were transmitted to the poll body’s server in an hour after polls closed, according to a report by the ABS-CBN.
The KBP (Kapisanan ng mga Brodkaster ng Pilipinas), NAMFREL (National Citizens Movement for Free Elections), and LENTE (Legal Network for Truthful Elections) meanwhile will receive soft copies of the said transmission logs "even without request," said Comelec Chairman George Garcia.
Garcia in a letter dated March 20 said they will be releasing transmission logs “to erase doubts as to the transmission of the votes in the first hour after the close of polls” in the May elections.
“Col. Odoño will get the certified hard copies of the same.”
Results of the elections were quickly reflected on transparency servers last year, prompting some groups to question the speed of the vote counting.
In a protest a day after the elections, one of the protesters, Fr. Robert Reyes, described it as “a dark magical moment in Philippine history.”
READ: Asserting 'poll fraud', protesters reject Marcos victory at Comelec HQ
Garcia said in an interview that the poll body was able to determine the source of the seven-hour glitch in the 2019 midterm elections and a week prior to the 2022 national and local elections glitch, he added that the Comelec has since updated its system to prevent a repeat of that.
He explained then that the data will be sent to the transparency servers “in bulk” with 106,000 voting precincts sending in data by batches of 10,000, making data available fast without having necessarily overloading the system.
READ: Comelec: System, processes updated to prevent hours-long glitch that marred 2019 polls
In the March 20 letter, the poll body noted that the transmission logs have been provided to lawmakers part of the Joint Congressional Oversight Committee on the Automated Election Systems and the Parish Pastoral Council on Responsible Voting last year.
Comelec said the document may be picked up at its Intramuros headquarters by Odoño on Thursday, March 23, once provisions of the request have been greenlighted.
“The commission hopes that the provision of the transmission logs will clear the controversies you stated,” Garcia said. “However, any subsequent specific questions that you may have on the transmission logs will be answered by the commission.”
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