EDITORIAL - Ready for the ARMM elections?

Over a million people in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao are expected to cast their votes today for a new governor and members of their 24-seat assembly. Will the true choices of the voters be known? That question must be asked as the ARMM polls will be the first electoral exercise to be supervised by the Commission on Elections since serious allegations of vote rigging were hurled against President Arroyo and Comelec officials.

The Comelec has become so discredited there are growing calls for the impeachment of all its commissioners. Comelec officials have complained of trial by publicity and have vowed to make the ARMM elections a showcase of the poll body’s capability to do its job. Whether the Comelec can deliver on its promise remains to be seen. The scandal over wiretapped conversations has raised serious questions about the credibility of the agency entrusted with supervising one of the bedrocks of democracy — free elections. Yesterday Malacañang urged ARMM voters to shun the so-called three Gs — guns, goons and gold — in picking their new local officials. The joke was that a fourth "G" should be added, for former Comelec commissioner Virgilio Garcillano, who remains in hiding.

The ARMM is home to the Abu Sayyaf, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, training camps of the Jemaah Islamiyah terrorist group, tribal clans and political warlords with private armies, and no one is betting that the government can stop candidates from resorting to the three Gs to influence the vote. Now the fourth G, or rather, the possibility of Comelec officials favoring certain candidates and conniving in vote-rigging, has become an additional concern.

It’s unlikely that public perceptions of the Comelec will improve after the ARMM elections. The nation’s electoral system needs a major overhaul, and it should start with a sweeping reorganization of the Comelec. In the meantime, the nation is stuck with the poll body and a culture where the three Gs have been long entrenched.

Seven gubernatorial bets have withdrawn from the ARMM race, and the Moro National Liberation Front has announced a boycott. The ARMM voter’s list is said to be padded by about 100,000 votes. People of the ARMM will just have to do what they can to safeguard the integrity of their vote.