Monday, February 12, 2007 P400M devices idle By Linette C. Ramos Sun.Star Staff Reporter
WITH the manual conduct of the May 14 polls, the Commission on Elections’ (Comelec) P400-million equipment bought in 2004 will continue to gather dust at the local poll offices.
Local poll officials already said the automation of the election process cannot be implemented in time for the coming elections for lack of time, logistics and legal basis.
And while the Supreme Court has not approved poll automation, the voting, counting, recounting, canvassing and transmittal of election results will be done manually, Cebu City Election Officer for the North District Marchel Sarno said.
This means the three satellite dishes and 11 sets of high-end desktop computers bought before the presidential elections in 2004 will still not serve their purpose this year.
The equipment for the poll automation cost the government some P360 to P400 million at that time.
Three years after they were bought, three very small aperture terminals (VSAT), a gadget similar to a satellite dish, have gathered dust at the Cebu City poll office.
Sarno said they did not bother to send the VSATs to Manila because they can no longer be used anyway. Some of the computers were sent to the central office, while some remained here and were used for the registration of voters.
“We still cannot use the equipment because unless there is a law that says it can be used for this year’s election, it is considered prohibited and illegal. So like in the last election, everything will still be done manually this May 14,” Sarno told Sun.Star Cebu.
Besides, he continued, even if the polls are automated, Comelec will still rely on the election returns and certificates of canvass (COC) from the local poll offices for the final results of the elections.
Sarno said the election results will still not be tamper-proof if the election process is automated since there could still be errors or manipulation of the results when they are encoded into the computers.
“So mahug lang na wala gyud to’y gamit ang VSATs for the quick count because in the end, the election returns and COCs will be used as basis. Even if we’re able to transmit the results to Manila electronically, there is still a chance the data will contradict the hard copy because of errors and manipulation,” he explained.
Comelec bought the transmission machines in April 2004 to be used for its “very quick” count.
But four days before the 2004 election, the Supreme Court prevented the Comelec from conducting its electronic quick count project and using the VSAT, while it deliberated on a petition from the opposition camp.
The High Tribunal issued a status quo order following a petition from lawyer Sixto Brillantes, who questioned the poll body’s use of electronic machines even after the court had ruled against the computerized counting and canvassing of votes.
The opposition had argued that a quick count by Comelec will only create “trending” and confusion in the polls.
