Probe on ballot folder mess not forgotten — Comelec

The Commission on Elections (Comelec) on Monday assured the public that it has not forgotten the investigation on the botched P690-million ballot secrecy folder contract amid the preparations for country's first ever nationwide automated elections next week. "There is no danger of this investigation being forgotten. The answers are coming... let the institutional solution take its course," Comelec spokesman James Jimenez said at a press briefing. The poll body was expected to come out with the findings of the probe last April 30 but Comelec Commissioner Gregorio Larrazabal said they have yet to receive a copy of the report from the three-man panel assigned to work on the case. The team, headed by Comelec law department head Ferdinand Rafanan, is expected to look into the recommendation of the poll body's Bids and Awards Committee to award the ballot secrecy folder contract to supplier One Time Carbon (OTC) Paper Supply. Worth P690 million, the contract covers supply and delivery of 1,815,000 pieces of 25-inch long ballot secrecy folders priced at P380 each. The poll body scrapped the contract because it was supposedly "extravagant beyond the ordinary needs of the Commission." It also said the number of folders to be purchased exceeded the total number that may actually be used during the elections. Jimenez had earlier said that the investigation is taking some "surprising turns" in terms of where the investigation is headed. He said they discovered that OTC had been a supplier of the Comelec for quite some time now and that some "connections" have become "more apparent" during the investigation. But on Monday, he said that they cannot "force" Rafanan to immediately come out with the report. "We're just waiting for him to submit... you don't issue ultimatums to people, this is not a hostage situation," he said. — Kimberly Jane Tan/RSJ/KBK, GMANews.TV