Filipinos Prepare for First-ever Automated Elections

MANILA—Filipinos will vote in the May 10 general election through an  “automated elections system”, which promises to speed up time spent at the ballot box, a quicker results count and a supposedly fraudulent-free process.

But with the Philippines’ history of violent and fraud-stained elections, where ballot boxes can be snatched in broad daylight and votes can be padded or shaved to favor candidates, critics are wary that the high-tech system, no matter how advanced it may be, can still be misused by politicians.

Volunteers carry on their backs a guide on how to vote, a sample ballot and images of a counting machine along a market in Manila. (Photo: Reuters)

Comelec, the country’s election authority, has purchased 82,000 precinct count optical scanner (PCOS) machines from Smartmatic-TIM, which won the contract to supply the automated equipment, in a move to finally automate the elections and finally eradicate cheating and maneuvers.

A PCOS machine is a terminal that scans completed ballot papers.
Voters only need to shade the circle next to the name of their chosen candidate, making the entire process seamless and faster compared to the traditional voting system.

“Apart from the way the system has been designed (which is to be) resistant to cheating, the number of people watching the process unfold really prevents anything from happening,” Comelec spokesman James Jimenez told Manila journalists.

Jimenez said anybody tempted to cheat would “find it very difficult and an unprofitable venture.”

The Center for People Empowerment in Governance (CenPEG), a policy institute based at the University of the Philippines, however, said it is convinced the PCOS machines are “vulnerable to wholesale electronic cheating.”

CenPEG director Prof Bobby Tuazon said the system that  “lacks transparency,” making it “susceptible to automated cheating, aside from its being prone to errors and hardware deficiencies.”

Comelec Commissioner Gregorio Larrazabal, head of the poll automation steering committee, said it was anticipated that some voting machines will malfunction, but insisted that would not affect the outcome of the May 10 election.

He said voters would have to recast their votes manually if voting machines assigned in their precincts failed to work properly, although this was not expected.

An organization of computer professionals claimed that the voting machines will actually make cheating and fraud in the election  “swift and simple.”

The Computer Professionals’ Union (CPU) said there are four significant technical challenges embedded in the system, which Filipinos need to understand. These are insider threats, software engineering limitations, network vulnerabilities and required auditing procedures.

“The whole system is very vulnerable for fraud and cheating”, said Rick Bahague, CPU's national coordinator. “We, as computer professionals, are concerned about the competency of the so called technological advancement which this government is trying to implement hastily.”

Jimenez, however, sought to allay fears. “The only time they are connected to the network is for the two minutes of transmission,” he said. “The canvassing system, while they are on line, will be monitored from many sources and we have numerous backups. So even if a cheating operation is initiated, it will easily be discovered.”

Concern has been voiced about the existence of mobile phone signal jammers, which can block the electronic transmission of votes from polling precincts to canvassing centers on election day.

The May 10 automated polls will utilize the services of telecommunication companies in transmitting the counted votes from the polling precincts to the canvassing centers. Comelec
says it's concerned about the reported arrival in the country of some 5,000 jammers of mobile phone signals.

Comelec said it had received information that the jammers had been smuggled into the country three weeks ago. The agency is now coordinating investigations with the Bureau of Customs.

Mars W. Mosqueda Jr is a Cebu-based journalist who has been covering various news events around the Philippines for the past 10 years.