Worst case scenario would be partial automation in some areas

The Commission on Elections (Comelec) is 1 month behind schedule in its preparations for the first-ever nationwide automated polls in 2010, but gave assurances that the electoral exercise will push through.

Comelec Chair Jose Melo on Tuesday said there had been delays in the delivery of the counting machines, but it was in turn caused by the case filed with the Supreme Court by a citizens' group seeking to nullify the contract between the poll body and Smartmatic/TIM, the supplier of the Precinct Count Optical Scan (PCOS) machines for the elections.

“Medyo nagipit tayo sa panahon. We try to catch up with the deadlines. We are behind the schedule by one month,” Melo told reporters.

The Concerned Citizens' Movement led by lawyer Harry Roque sought to nullify the P7.3-billion contract, but the tribunal junked their petition. It has filed an appeal.

The same group filed on Monday a supplemental motion for reconsideration, telling the high tribunal that the automation contract had been breached after the parties failed to provide budget for satellite communications in phone-deprived areas and after the production of the machines was transferred from a company in Taiwan to another in Shanghai, China.

'Not so bleak'
 
The poll body said that they are expecting the delivery of around 40,000 of the machines by the end of December and another 40,000 machines before the end of January.
 
Should the delivery of the machines be delayed, Melo gave assurances that the automation will push through, albeit only partially in some areas.

“The worst scenario is not so bleak,” Melo said, adding that they may resort to the same contingency plan adopted in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao last year, where they gathered the ballots in some areas and brought them to a central system to be counted.
 
“Our plan is precinct count all over. If there are not enough machines, in other areas the ballots will just be brought to central counting areas,” he said.

"There is no postponing the election. That's a no-no," the chairman said.

Spare machines

Commissioner Gregorio Larrazabal said that there will be 82,000 machines, and 200 spare. Melo said they are even expecting that there will be more spare machines since the number of the precincts has been reduced to 78,000 from 80,000 as a result of compressing the clustering of precints.
 
The Comelec needs to hire and train IT specialists and to coordinate with the Department of Education for the training of teachers on how to go about the automated process.
 
Larrazabal said there are currently 80 Comelec IT personnel being trained to test the machines; 100 more will be needed next year. He said that Smartmatic is also hiring its own IT people for next year's elections.
 
Melo, meanwhile, said that the poll body has to come out first with a general instructions before they start the training of teachers. "Once the general intructions is out, they will know what to do. Until the general instruction is promulgated, we ourselves don't know what to tell them." (Newsbreak)