Press Release
July 3, 2009

Gordon proposes parceling out of elections to automate 2010 polls

Senator Richard J. Gordon (Ind.) has proposed parceling out of the elections supply contract to several vendors instead of awarding the whole contract to just one to ensure the automation of the May 2010 presidential elections.

Gordon, father of election modernization in the country and author of Republic Act 9369 or the amended Automated Elections System Law, said that dividing the contract among several bidders who will supply automation technologies for each of the three major islands will ensure that the machines will be delivered on time.

"Let us put it this way. If the problem now is being able to buy the machines on time, the Comelec (Commission on Elections), because it is in-charge under the Constitution of conducting the elections, can parcel out the election. You can actually meet the deadline and be able to test it three months before the elections. In the United States , every state has its own machines," he said.

"So you can actually do this, Luzon can be under one supplier, Visayas can be under another, and Mindanao can be under another vendor. I've been suggesting that. However, the Comelec insisted on talking to only one bidder. That raised my eyebrows already but you know the Senate cannot impose itself on the Comelec on this matter," he added.

The whole country was virtually held hostage with the threat of having to go back to cheating-marred manual elections after the withdrawal of the winning bidder's local partner Total Information Management (TIM) from the joint venture and the Commission on Elections' announcement that there is no more time for a new bidding.

The joint venture of TIM and Smartmatic Corp. was about to be awarded the P7.2 Billion contract to supply 82,200 precinct count optical machines (PCOS) when TIM suddenly pulled out of its partnership citing "irreconcilable differences."

Gordon reprimanded the Comelec for showing lack of foresight when it failed to consider the risk in relying on only one supplier and one technology; and not taking contingency measures for emergency situations such as the present predicament.

"All these indicate a very cavalier attitude by the Comelec. The Comelec has been very cavalier in failing to have any redundancy imposed within the system. The entire country is held hostage by the foolishness of these people," he said.

The senator stressed that the Comelec has been trying to implement automation for the last 12 years since the country passed its first automated elections system law yet botched every attempt except for the joint Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) - Optical Mark Reader (OMR) voting exercise which was finally conducted in August 2008 in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM).

"The Comelec must see its way clear in conducting this election as required by law. There can be no excuse. If they cannot, then I demand as a senator that they all resign," Gordon said.

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