Filtered By: Topstories
News

Comelec asked to defer signing of automation deal


MANILA, Philippines – Senator Francis Escudero on Tuesday urged the Commission on Elections (Comelec) to delay the signing a contract with the winning bidder in the P11.3-billion automation project for next year’s elections. This was after Escudero found out during a hearing of the Senate Committee on Constitutional Amendments, which he chairs, that the secretary certificate of the Smartmatic-Total Information Management Corp. consortium was not properly authenticated. He said the Comelec should allot at least a day to review the contract before proceeding with the approval of contract and issuance of notice that is scheduled on Friday, June 26. The senator particularly questioned why the secretary certificate, which contains the basic information about the Smartmatic, was authenticated by the Philippine embassy in Washington D.C. instead of the Philippine consulate in Caracas, Venezuela. Escudero noted that the consulate in Caracas had jurisdiction over Barbados, where Smartmatic is located. He also said he saw, upon perusal of the bidding documents, several corporations related to Smartmatic. “Smartmatic was referred to as a Netherlands-based company in some. It was mentioned or described as a Barbados-based company, and Smartmatic was also sometimes described as a Venezuelan company in the bidding documents," he said. Smartmatic spokesperson Cesar Flores said that firm’s holding company is based in the Netherlands and also owns a company in Barbados. He said they are referred as a Venezuelan company because most of their stockholders were from Venezuela, and that 70 percent of their personnel were Venezuelans. “It is common practice in multinational [companies] to have a holding company and companies incorporated throughout the world," he told the panel. He said the one that cornered the poll automation project in the Philippines was their subsidiary in Barbados, which he said presents their proposals around the world. Flores said the document was authenticated in Washington D.C. because the Philippines has no embassy in Barbados. Ferdinand Rafanan, chairman of the Comelec’s Special Bids and Awards Committee (SBAC), admitted that the poll body was not aware of the wrong authentication and vowed to look into the matter before they ink the contract. "This issue was not obvious at all," Rafanan told the committee as he stressed that the documents were shown to the public and the other bidders during the bidding process. Escudero said Comelec should have checked with the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) if the procedure followed by Smartmatic was correct. Other issues The senator also said that financial capability of the Smartmatic seems to be problematic as its net worth is only $35 million or P1.5 billion but it presented a bid of P7.2 billion to the Comelec. “Ibig sabihin parang igigisa tayo sa sariling mantika. Wala naman silang inilabas na pera, kung magkano ang ibabayad natin sa kanila yun din ang gagamitin nila panggawa nito [They will not shell out any money and they will use our payment to run the project]," he said. It was also learned during the hearing that the poll body and Smartmatic-TIM was yet to identify the mode that would be used to transmit the results of the automated polls. Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile asked the Comelec and the winning consortium how are they going to bring the machines to the polling precincts, how the automation would be conducted, and the mode of transmission that would be used. Flores said they still need to conduct a survey on the precincts in different parts of the country to determine the condition of the place and find out which mode of transmission they would use in a particular area. He said they would be able to submit their complete project plan in eight to ten weeks after the awarding of the contract this Friday. “Once we signed this contract, we will start surveying all the precincts in the Philippines. This survey serves different purposes, first, find out the condition of precincts, find out the power condition, and find out the coverage of telecommunications," Flores told senators. He said their technology and machines can work with a mobile phone, landline and a satellite. “Once we have that survey, we will be able to tell you this precinct in this region will use cellphone, this precinct will use landline, this precinct will use satellite." He said they have already met with the telecommunications companies which provided them with coverage map. “With this coverage map, we know which areas are covered today and for those areas with no coverage we will provide a satellite transmission…we will set up a satellite antennae that will allow us to transmit (the election results)," Flores said. Enrile however expressed doubt whether Smartmatic would be able to finish the survey within the timeframe due to the geographical make up of the country. “Sir, I do not know your capability. If you have not studied the geography and topography of the Philippines you will not be able to do it within the timeframe that we have up to May next year," the Senate leader said, adding that unlike other countries, the Philippines is an archipelago and some parts of the country are hard to reach even with a chopper. Clustering In a presentation before the committee on constitutional amendments, revision of codes and law, Comelec executive director Jose Tolentino said as of April 20, 2009, the country has 44, 009,69 registered voters after deactivation of 1,246, 272 records due to the voter's failure to vote in two successive elections and cancellation of 58,327 voters who are already dead. He said with the automation of the poll, they would be establishing 80, 136 clustered precincts from the previous 320, 415 precincts. He said a maximum of five established precincts in the same polling center in the same barangay (village) will be clustered. The final clustering will be made after the registration of voters, the latest by December. He said they will procure 82,000 machines from Smartmatic so that some 2,000 units will serve as back up. He said the machines will have a battery that would last for 12 hours in case there will be a power failure. He said the voting period will be from 7 in the morning to 6 in the evening. - GMANews.TV
LOADING CONTENT