Former President Joseph Estrada was the very first presidential candidate to become an “automated voter” after he cast a sample vote using the Smartmatic precinct count optical scan (PCOS) machine yesterday during a briefing organized by his political party, the Pwersa ng Masang Pilipino (PMP), at the Club Filipino in Greenhills, San Juan City.Held before a packed audience of PMP officials, staff, party workers and volunteers, the briefing on the 2010 automated elections was the very first of its kind organized by a political party and signals the PMP’s commitment to be a force to reckon with in the forthcoming elections.
At a briefing by the poll body for the PMP, Estrada personally tested the automatic voting machines.
Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile, chairman emeritus of PMP, and San Juan Mayor Joseph Victor “JV” Ejercito were also present to test the voting machines in the presence of Comelec spokesman
James Jimenez after his briefing.
While the briefing went smoothly, calls for vigilance for clean and honest elections in 2010 were still made. Estrada spokesman Margaux Salcedo said: “While we can see that the Comelec is exerting all its efforts to ensure its preparedness for the 2010 polls, we also need an assurance from Malacañang that a scenario such as the Hello Garci scandal will not happen again in 2010.”
PMP Spokesman lawyer Ralph Calinisan, who also hosted yesterday’s event said the party was wasting no time in acquainting itself with the intricacies of automation.
Calinisan expressed his hopes that the briefing would underscore the serious intent of the masang Pilipino to reclaim what was once theirs -- the presidency -- through peaceful, orderly, transparent and accurate automated elections.
Comelec director James Jimenez, and Smartmatic’s Miguel Avila, were on hand to conduct the briefing on every step of the automated voting process.
Both Jimenez and Avila accepted the PMP’s challenge to ensure clean and orderly elections.
Meanwhile, the supplier of the country’s first fully automated elections are confident that they can hire the needed 50,000 information technology experts who will manage the 82,200 PCOS machines.
According to Bonifacio Belen, regional manager of Smartmatic International Corp.-Total Information Management Corp. (TIM) said they will hire some 50,000 “technical support representatives” who will troubleshoot the PCOS machines to be used in 2010 polls.
Belen also said that they already coordinated with the recruitment firms Placewell, Manred and Ventureslink to recruit the information technology specialists who will be deployed in polling centers come the May 10, 2010 elections.
“There is no shortage of patriotic and IT-savvy Filipinos who want to be part of history,” he said.
But Bonifacio said it would not be easy for the IT specialist since they would be subjected to a series of rigid trainings to educate them on how PCOS machines works to familiarize them with the machines and also to immediately address and troubleshoot any problems especially during the election day itself.
Comelec Commissioner Gregorio Larrazabal said the experts would have to be certified by the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) before they can take part in the election next year.
He added that they also intend to hire one IT expert per municipality and city to supervise the specialists of Smartmatic-TIM.
The consortium of Smartmatic-TIM is also mandated to do a background check on the IT specialists that they would hire to ensure that they have no connection to a candidate in the polling precincts where they would be assigned.
But as a precautionary measure, Larrazabal said the IT expert will not be deployed to an area where he resides or originated.
Also, Larrazabal said the IT specialists will not be allowed to operate the PCOS machines, but only trouble shoot, with representatives from poll watchdog groups and political parties as witnesses.
Marie Surbano
Source: http://www.tribune.net.ph/headlines/20091111hed4.html
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