SC chief warns vs automation of polls in 2010 amid lawsuit

Chief Justice Reynato Puno has reminded the Commission on Elections (Comelec) to carefully study the legal implications of going through another bidding for the automation of the 2010 presidential elections. He said this might be in conflict with a pending appeal on the Comelec’s alleged botched poll modernization project before the Supreme Court. “I don’t know their plans. Maybe they need to explain what they mean by pre-bidding and how this will affect the pending case…The Ombudsman’s decision is still being appealed to the Supreme Court," Puno said of the petition’s status. Puno told this to reporters at the sidelines of the celebration of the National Bible Week, where he was one of the special guests last Friday. He made the advice amid the finalization of the terms of reference (TOR) for the modernization of elections for 2010 by the Comelec’s technical advisory council within the week. The TOR will serve as guide for companies interested in bidding for the P2.6-billion poll modernization project. Last week, James Jimenez, spokesman for the Comelec, said the commission’s advisory council was set to “finalize" the TOR so that bidding could start for the country’s long-delayed computerized polls. In 2004, the Supreme Court nullified the P1.3-billion automated counting machine (ACM) project after finding irregularities in the bidding process. It also asked the Office of the Ombudsman to find out if poll officials were liable for criminal charges. It also ordered the Comelec to recover its payment from Mega Pacific eSolutions Inc. But the firm filed a case before a lower court preventing the Comelec from reimbursing P1 billion that it paid the company. An appeal was also filed by a civil society group before the Supreme Court questioning the Ombudsman’s decision clearing Comelec officials of accountability over the ACM project. The almost 2,000 machines under the ACP project are stored at the Comelec warehouse in Manila. The government pays an annual storage fee of P3.979 million for the said machines. - GMANews.TV