Drilon asks SC to decide early on automated polls

CITY OF MALOLOS – Senate President Franklin Drilon wants the Supreme Court (SC) to decide early on whether the 2016 national elections should be automated.

Speaking at the graduation rites of the Bulacan Agricultural State College on Thursday, Drilon said he does not want a return to manual voting in 2016.

“Based on our laws, automated election must be implemented, not manual counting,” he said.

At the House of Representatives, Isabela Rep. Rodolfo Albano III urged the Commission on Elections (Comelec) to plan for a hybrid type of election in 2016 after the SC stopped the Comelec from engaging Smartmatic-TIM to prepare its 80,000 precinct count optical scan ( PCOS) machines for the 2016 elections.

“The Comelec should prepare for a combination of automated and manual system of voting, counting and tabulation as an alternative to fully automated balloting,” he said.

The poll body acquired the 80,000 PCOS machines from SmartmaticTIM, which was its automation service and equipment supplier in the 2010 and 2013 polls.

Before retiring last February, Comelec Chairman Sixto Brillantes Jr. awarded to SmartmaticTIM the contract of more than P200 million to test and prepare the machines for next year.

Albano said the SC must resolve the issue surrounding the transaction as soon as possible so as not to unduly delay preparations for the 2016 presidential, congressional and local elections.

“We should stick to the automated election option as much as possible, because that is the mandate of the law and because it is faster and less prone to cheating,” he said.

However, if this is not feasible, Albano said the poll body must start considering a combination of automated-manual balloting.

“We can do the voting and counting of ballots at the precinct level manually, and automate the tabulation and transmission of votes,” he said.