Real automated election

The forthcoming elections in 2016 is only the third time we will have an automated elections, but there are still some doubts on whether the system really serve its purpose of ensuring that we have an honest, peaceful and orderly elections. These doubts remain mainly because of many incidents arising after the previous elections in 2010 and 2013 that somehow affect the credibility and correctness of the results with the use of the same Smartmatic PCOS machines.

And so up to now, the burning issue is still whether or not these machines are indeed reliable in determining the real choice of the electorate. This is still the issue simply because there are those who keep on vehemently insisting that there is nothing wrong with the machines despite the alleged “glitches” found during the previous elections. They disagree with the findings of IT experts that these machines are defective and prone to manipulations. They say that the PCOS are reliable in giving out fast and accurate results of the election and that these alleged “glitches” are just isolated incidents and do not affect the overall outcome of the voting and counting. Thus they even defend the Comelec’s decision to purchase from Smartmatic Inc. 82,000 additional machines for use in 2016.

Both sides to this hot issue seem to miss the point. Actually it is not about these machines used in automating our electoral process. It is more about whether the law providing for an automated election system (R.A. 9369) has been followed, particularly the safeguards ensuring the credibility of the figures churned out by these PCOS machines. Even if there are no defects in these machines, even if they perfectly reflect the true choices of our electorate, the automated election law which authorizes their use must still be observed. Using a perfect machine is not an excuse for violating the law allowing its use.

Apparently, there were violations of several sections of RA 9369 committed in the last two elections which up to now have not been denied or successfully refuted and disproven by the Comelec which purchased and used these machines.

First and foremost is Section 12 requiring a certified source code ensuring that the ballot of each voter will be read properly; that the votes will be counted correctly by the PCOS machines; that the results transmitted are not tainted with fraud; and that the compact flash (CF) cards  in the machines will accurately record the data. Pursuant to this section, the Comelec should allow any interested political party and/or groups to review this source code. In fact the Supreme Court has already required the Comelec to furnish said code to a movement called Center for People Empowerment in Governance (CenPEG) for purposes of review. But said decision has never been complied with.

Secondly, there was no complete and accurate information on whether a Random Manual Audit (RMA) has been conducted in two clustered precincts of each legislative district and the results thereof as provided in Section 29. Such report should have been submitted before the proclamation of winners. But in the last two elections so many winners were already proclaimed even before the RMAs have conducted and their results submitted. Without this complete information on the RMA, there is no way of finding out whether the machines correctly counted the votes, the magnitude of the breakdowns of the machines and the actual number of machines that successfully transmitted the results.

Third, in the May 3, 2010 final testing and sealing (FTS) of the machines, it was discovered that 72,000 compact flash (CF) cards contained erroneous data and had malfunctioned. There was also no accurate information on whether the new CF cards were correctly reconfigured to insure the correctness of the counting of votes and how many of the cards reached their destination before the election. It was not also known whether FTS were conducted in 73, 340 precincts nationwide.

The fourth violation refers to the digital signatures of the Board of Election Inspectors on the elections returns (ERs) transmitted to the Comelec. The ERs with the digital signatures are the legal bases for the proclamation of winners. But the Comelec has apparently dispensed with them in the 2010 elections. Its own website reveals that only summarized election returns were transmitted. In fact in the 2010 elections, the former Comelec Chairman already appeared on TV reading the first transmitted results at 6:30 p.m. when the polls are supposed to close at 7 pm..The Smartmatic machines at the National Canvassing Center also registered a highly excessive 153,902,003 number of voters when the actual figure was only 51 million.

Obviously these violations should have prompted our officials to discontinue using these machines instead of acquiring more of them and using them in the coming elections. They are also enough reasons for our election officials and the present government to review the present automated election system to give more teeth to the law so as to prevent these flagrant acts and omissions.

More importantly perhaps is to consider another automated system where the people’s right of suffrage will be properly exercised. It must be pointed out here that this right of suffrage can be truly exercised only if the people themselves fill out the ballots and write the names of the candidates they would like to elect. This is the core of the right of suffrage. They should be allowed to write their choices instead of the machines doing it for them.

But to insure a faster and more honest count of their votes, the machines can be used. The machines can ensure that once the voter has cast his vote it will already be counted and properly canvassed. There will be no more dagdag-bawas here. After all, the main purpose of automation is not to expedite the voting process but to know the accurate results faster where manipulations are no longer possible. In other words we should have a manual voting and an automated counting and canvassing. In fact this is the method used in Germany. And recently Australia has also discarded the e-voting system. We should follow suit.

*      *      *

Email: [email protected]