A Call for Greater Transparency Regarding COMELEC Preparations for the First Automated National Elections

* This statement was submitted to the Commission on Elections (Comelec) during the dialogue between Commissioner Rene V. Sarmiento and Pagbabago! convenors on 9 November 2009 at the Comelec office in Manila.

A Call for Greater Transparency Regarding COMELEC Preparations for the First Automated National Elections

by Pagbabago! People’s Movement for Change

The Pagbabago! People’s Movement for Change calls on the COMELEC to undertake greater transparency and step up efforts to inform the public about the status and timetable for setting up the Automated Election System (AES). This is in light of growing concern that the current poll automation may end up merely creating a technological smokescreen for electoral fraud and cheating, the failure of elections or the failure to proclaim the rightful winners even if elections do take place.

The main question we propound to the COMELEC is what is the status and timetable for the setting up the AES? In particular:

1) What is the status of the production and delivery of the machines -- the Precinct Count Optical Scan-Optical Mark Reader (PCOS-OMR) that will read then count the votes and transmit the vote tallies at the end of voting day to the Consolidation and Canvassing System (CCS)? This query is in light the sudden change in the foreign company subcontracted by Smartmatic to manufacture the 82,500 electronic voting machines and the pullout of the Aboitiz-owned 2Go from its contract to provide logistics services in terms of delivering and maintaining the machines all over the country.
2) What is the status of the programming of the machines and when will controversial aspects of programming be resolved? Specifically:
(a) will the source code be made public and when;
(b) what will be the system for voter verification that the PCOS-OMR read the ballot correctly; why did COMELEC disable this function from the PCOS-OMR?
(c) will there be a system for verifying that the approved program is installed in each PCOS/CCS machine; what is the COMELEC’s response to various proposals to address this, eg allowing political parties, media and PPCRV to bring their own compact flash readers to ensure data integrity of PCOS initialization and eventual results (Lozada); Comelec should subject the approved program to a hash verifier function (Cenpeg).
(d) what is the system for ensuring that the election return can no longer be digitally altered after the BEI personnel signs it as correct; what is COMELEC’s response to criticism that it is Smartmatic that assigns the digital signatures to all members of the BEI and BOC; what is COMELEC’s reponse to the proposal to create and Independent Certificate Authority that will issue and certify digital signatures of all transmitted data, to provide a trustworthy third party validator.
(e) how will the AES system operator do his work so as to prevent undue or fraudulent interference in the voting, balloting and canvassing process.
3) What is the status and timetable for COMELEC publication of the general rules on the conduct of the elections, including the rules on election protests, to give political parties, media and election watchdogs enough time to prepare.
4) What is the status of the training of the operators (teachers and others who will run the machines), supervisors (COMELEC and other officials), plus the watchers and watchdogs, not to mention the voters themselves.

Pagbabago! reiterates the call of a broad cross-section of the citizenry that COMELEC release the source code of the AES. The source code provides the instructions for the counting, canvassing, transmission and security of the votes and election results. Opening the source code for independent review is then one of the core safeguards for transparency of poll automation to remove any doubt that votes will be counted correctly.

Field conditions in the country are also far from ideal and, especially in the absence of meaningful pilot testing, enough small untoward events could happen to disrupt polling. Normal election days already see countless unanticipated difficulties as it is – using 82,000 precinct machines and 1,800 canvassing computers in untested conditions multiplies vulnerabilities many times over. The COMELEC is already behind in its timetable of releasing the general rules governing the elections last October. What about the requisite training of all concerned in the operation of the AES which is critical if the AES is to work properly.

It is also important to highlight that poll automation is no magic bullet against electoral fraud and many traditional methods of cheating are unaddressed. Large-scale ballot-switching can still take place – and indeed this would actually be even easier to do and harder to detect because of the more impersonal machine-readable ballots used. Voters and election officials can still be bribed or intimidated to favour certain candidates. There could still be flying voters, ghost registration and precincts.

All these concerns need to be addressed in order to bolster confidence in the May 2010 elections and prevent potentially volatile conditions. The disorder on the day of elections and in the subsequent canvassing could be enough to render the poll outcomes particularly contentious and even lead to a failure of elections or failure of proclamation. In short the May 2010 elections will be greatly compromised if the flaws and controversies surrounding the AES are left unresolved.

Pagbabago! People’s Movement fort Change supports any and all efforts for genuine democratic elections in the country where the people can choose leaders truly able to uphold their rights, interests and welfare. A clean, honest and fair election is an indispensable sine qua non to such an aspiration. #