ITS PCOS AGAIN IN 2013
by Ducky Paredes
VOTING 5-2, the Commission on Elections (Comelec) has decided to
take the "option to purchase" on the 82,000 Precinct Count Optical
Scan (PCOS) machines used in the May 2010 elections, along with the software
for the Automated Election System (AES) technology and a new consolidation and
canvassing system for a discounted price of P1.8 billion.
While two Commissioners disagreed with the decision, it was
probably the best way to go. The PCOS machines worked in 2010 where we had an election
with all the results out in a little over a week and -- this is the important
thing -- there were no major complaints from losing candidates. Of course, the
PCOS machines could have done better. In the 2010 elections, several safety
features were disabled. Still, the PCOS gave us credible results in record
time.
For the 2013 elections, the present Comelec promises a PCOS that
will work even better than it did in 2010. It should, because there are already
persons trained on the machines and the voters are already familiar with the
system. If the Comelec decided to try still another automated voting system,
would they be ready in time for May 2013? In making its decision, the Comelec chose the least problematic
route. The Comelec has neither the luxury of time nor the funds to gambit on
new machines that may not even work for us. The PCOS, except to the
techno-geeks who wanted the election to be even more rigidly
protocol-compliant, worked wonderfully.
Getting the machines at a huge discount also removed this
"major, major" headache for the Comelec: sourcing funds for the 2013
elections. The Comelec proposed a budget of P10 billion for next year’s
political exercise, but Congress gave it only P7 billion. Comelec Chairman Sixto Brillantes had already pointed out in
news forums as early as last year that opting to buy the PCOS units would be
the most prudent and practical alternative for the poll body, because it would
only cost P1.8 billion, or a third of its total value, to buy them.
We should all accept the truth that the PCOS elections in 2010
were our most successful elections ever. Proof of this are the results of the
separate surveys conducted by the Social Weather Stations, Stratpolls and Pulse
Asia.
The international community also responded positively to the
outcome of the 2010 elections. Major world economies like the United States and
the countries of the European Union described the 2010 automated polls in the
Philippines as a resounding success. In fact, officials of developing countries
like Kenya, Nigeria and Liberia have expressed interest in visiting the
Philippines to find out how we did our 2010 automated elections.
Henrietta de Villa, the chairperson of the Parish Pastoral
Council for Responsible Voting (PPCRV), backed the Comelec’s choice of
Smartmatic-TIM’s PCOS machines and technology for next year’s elections. Her
only suggestion is for the Comelec to use shorter ballots to improve measures
to preserve the secrecy of the votes cast and for election officers at the
precinct level to undergo further training to master the use and handling of
the PCOS machines.
The Comelec would not have the luxury of even considering these
suggestions had it chosen to buy new machines, given its very limited time
frame and the 30% cut in its budget.
While it has the support of the PPCRV, the Comelec’s decision
did not sit well with mostly self-styled election reform activists who have so
far failed to prove the so-called flaws of the PCOS machines.
AES Watch, Center for People Empowerment in Governance (Cenpeg)
and Tandem have made it their common mission to disparage the PCOS machines and
Smartmatic-TIM.
These PCOS-AES bashers were the main backers of a rival
technology—the Open Election System (OES), which the Comelec couldn’t have
considered without violating the poll automation law. The OES proposed a
mongrel system combining manual voting and computerized canvassing. The Poll
Automaton Law called for total computerization of the electoral process.
Worse, returning to the use of manual counting using the OES
would still have made possible Dagdag-Bawas, a system of wholesale electoral
fraud that became past history with 2010’s full computerization of the
balloting from the precinct-level voting to the canvassing of votes.
I have to wonder why Senator Koko Pimentel seems to be listening
to the OES people. Koko was a victim of Dagdag-Bawas in 2007. These new allies
of Pimentel claim that the PCOS machines are defective. How can that be when an
international mission led by the Carter Center attest to the reliability of the
optical mark reader (OMR) technology used for the PCOS machines?
Unlike touch-enabled devices using direct recording electronic
(DRE) technology that leaves no paper trail, OMR technology assures the Comelec
of higher auditability because it uses paper ballots. This is why the Comelec
was able to carry out a manual recount of the votes in question in electoral
protest cases, such as those in the city of Manila and the congressional
district of Catanduanes. (In both, the manual count tallied with the computer’s
results.)
Sure, there were glitches in 2010 but for 2013 Chairman
Brillantes himself assures that these have already been addressed by
Smartmatic-TIM. These include the lack of ultraviolet mark sensors and digital
signatures, and problems with the compact flash cards, which contained stored
voting data and other instructions on how to operate the machines.
Smartmatic-TIM was able to address these concerns in preparation for the 2011
elections in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), which was reset
since it was synchronized with the 2013 polls.
The Carter Center, whose track record includes 80 election
observation missions in 30 countries over the past two decades, lauded the
Comelec and the other parties responsible for the clean and orderly conduct of
the 2010 elections, which, it concluded, was "marked by relatively high
public confidence and trust on the use of the OMR technology."
Further cementing the positive assessment of the Carter Center
mission on the conduct of the 2010 elections were the various testimonies it
had gathered before the National Board of Canvassers and the hearings of the
House Committee on Suffrage and Electoral Reforms on electoral complaints
regarding the AES, which "produced no concrete evidence of fraud and did
not impact the proclamation and certification of electoral results."
The observers noted, "voters generally appeared excited and
willing to use the new technology."
Given these findings, we are surprised why Sen. Aquilino
Pimentel III has joined the critics protesting the use of the PCOS technology
for the 2013 elections. (What makes this even stranger is that Pimentel is running under
the same Binay-led multiparty coalition as former Sen. Juan Miguel Zubiri, who
was the Dagdag-Bawas beneficiary. But that is another story.)
Pimentel, who should know better, being a victim of
Dagdag-Bawas, should be supporting, rather than protesting, the Comelec’s
decision to reuse the PCOS machines. For one, his votes in 2013 would be better protected by a technology
already tried and tested in the previous national elections.
The alternatives–a new technology yet unproven and unused in an
actual election here, or, (heaven forbid), a return to the Dagdag-Bawas-prone
manual voting and counting–would set back the impressive gains that the Comelec
had achieved in restoring the integrity of the Philippine ballot and securing
broad and deep support behind computerized balloting.
The Comelec did the right thing in going back to the PCOS and
don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.
Repost from Malaya Online
