Comelec to retain ballot template until May elections

The Commission on Elections (Comelec) will be keeping the digital copy template of ballots until the May polls, allowing the body to replace ballots that may be lost or damaged during transport. The poll body made this announcement on Friday, reversing its earlier decision that it will destroy the template once all ballots are printed. "We will not delete the files muna until election day just in case and to be sure we will be able adddress potential concerns before elections," Comelec Commissioner Gregorio Larrazabal told reporters after the ceremonial printing of the last ballot at the National Printing Office (NPO) in Quezon City on Friday. Prudence dictated the poll body to refrain from destroying the files just yet, Larrazabal told GMANews.TV in a separate interview. "We have to be sure," he said. "Kasi baka sabihin if we delete the files, people might say we're doing that para (because if we delete the files, people might say we're doing that) in case something happens we won't be able to do anything," he said.

Comelec spokesman James Jimenez likewise said that it is "necessary" to have the ballot files to be able to create "replacement" ballots for those that might be lost or destroyed during transit. "That's why we're only waiting until election day. On election day, all of the ballots are there, there's no need for any back up any more, on that day we will destroy the files," he said. Larrazabal said that the poll body will invite watchers once they finally decide to delete the files. Unused ballots will be destroyed after the polls, Jimenez added. There is bound to be unused ballots because there is not always a 100-percent voter turnout. Printers to be stored at the National Printing Office One Kodak printer will be shipped back to Shanghai while four others will stay at the NPO in case these might be needed to print more ballots, Larrazabal said. The machines, which will not print "unless required to," will be sealed and signed by Comelec chairman Jose Melo and Senator Francis Escudero and Congressman Teddy Boy Locsin, who are co-chairmen of the Joint Congressional Oversight Committee on Poll Automation. The four machines will be stored at the NPO and will still be under the supervision of the Comelec and the Smartmatic-Total Information Management (TIM), which supplied the automated poll equipment. In a separate interview with GMANews.TV, Smartmatic spokesman Gene Gregorio said that the company initially wanted to ship all of the printers back to where they came from after printing was finished. He said that it was the Comelec's decision to keep them until the elections. Larrazabal, for his part, admitted that some people are bound to criticize their decision about the ballot files and the printer. "Whatever we do, there will always be something to complain. (But) we have full confidence, we're doing our jobs well and we are ensuring that we have a credible, successful elections this May 10," he said. A 'milestone' for the Comelec Comelec chairman Jose Melo also emphasized that people should take notice of the poll body's achievements instead of its supposed shortcomings. The Commission proved people wrong when they said that the Precinct Count Optical Scan (PCOS) would not arrive on time and that they wouldn't be able to finish the printing of the ballots before their self-imposed deadline on April 25, Sunday. "But the PCOS machines arrived on time... and now the printing of the ballots came before the deadline we set for ourselves. We have completed another milestone in our preparation for the 2010 elections," he said. Smartmatic reported early Friday that the printing of 50,850,940 ballots ended at Thursday midnight. The last batch of 2,110 ballots, for three precincts in Nueva Vizcaya, were officially printed on Friday. But Locsin, who was present during the ceremonial printing, said critics are still bound to issue statements against this "achievement" of the Comelec. "I'm anticipating tomorrow they will say: why did you finish ahead of time, why did you finish in the middle of the night, what did you do in the middle of night," he said. Melo said he was just elated, saying that the completion of ballot printing precludes election failure. "With the ballots here, there will be elections, there will be no failure of elections whatsoever, we will proceed with the elections," he said. Ballots to be delivered to Mindanao on Saturday Starting Saturday, the first batch of ballots will be delivered to areas in Mindanao, considered the farthest from Manila. About half of the printed ballots are being stored at the Foreign Service Mail Distribution Center (FSMDC) in Manila after the NPO ran out of storage space. Smartmatic is in charge of delivering the ballots to the various municipal treasurers nationwide. On the other hand, the delivery of PCOS machines is ongoing. Jimenez told GMANews.TV that the Comelec has already shipped some voting machines to the Kalayaan Islands, Palawan, and Batanes. The Comelec has enlisted the services of forwarding firms Germalin Enterprises (National Capital Region), Ace Logistics (North and South Luzon), and Argo Forwarders (Visayas and Mindanao) for the transportation of the poll machines. The poll body had also earlier said that they have asked the police to help secure the delivery of election materials. In a statement released Friday, National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) chief Director Roberto Rosales said that all police patrol vehicles that will be used to transport election paraphernalia are equipped with Global Positioning System (GPS) Tracking Device to ensure that the security convoy strictly follows the schedule and route provided by the poll body. "The employment of GPS Tracking Device will greatly help us in monitoring the PCOS machines every time that they are moved from the hub to the polling centers and vice versa," he said. He said that the NCRPO office is set to transport 7,555 of the 82,200 PCOS machines and ballot boxes, 6.13 of the 5.8 million ballots and other election paraphernalia from the Comelec warehouse to the regional hubs and to 743 polling centers all over Metro Manila starting on Wednesday. He said that the security convoy team will be equipped with digital trunked radios and high-powered firearms while the cargo trucks will be led and tailed by patrol vehicles. Rosales added that they have set up a Regional Elections Monitoring Action Center (REMAC) inside Camp Bagong Diwa, which will is tasked to receive all election-related information from the different district offices and police stations. - GMANews.TV