Automated cheating

EDITORIAL

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04/29/2008

Again, computerization of elections — at least in the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) — is being rushed, with the consent of Congress.

The rush, as explained by Congress, is to test run automated polls in ARMM to enable the presidential polls in 2010 to be fully automated and thus, eliminate the cheating, only with ensuring a fast count, through these reading machines.

But what makes both Congress and the Commission on Elections (Comelec) think that by computerizing the polls, cheating would be eliminated?

It can be acknowledged that the counting, if done through machines, would certainly be faster, but speed need not necessarily mean that fraud will have been eliminated.

The fact remains that the cheating syndicate in the Comelec is still, and will still be, in existence, whether the polls are automated or done manually. And even in ARMM, or better yet, especially ARMM, the Comelec cheats who will still be manning these machines and who will be overseeing the polls would still be there, to cheat for whoever pays them the top amounts to win.

It is not merely a question of acquiring poll machines in a bid to stop the cheating through automation. There are many steps that can be categorized as election cheating.

In the printing of ballots and election returns, plus certificates of canvass, there are already great opportunities to cheat, as evidenced in the 2004 presidential polls.

There are printed much, much more ballots than required, not to mention more extras for cheating through substitution.

What is to stop the cheats from grabbing hold of the excess ballots, vote in advance for the voters passing through the machines, then feed the excess ballots for counting. Who then wins the race, if not the cheating candidate who has paid off the Comelec cheats to ensure his victory?

In registration, for example, there is already a lot of cheating done. It is no secret that in the ARMM, and no doubt elsewhere in the country, there are too many ghost voters, plus double registrants, plus, in the case of ARMM, children, anywhere from 10 to 16 years old are registered as voters. As this has been found out during the last elections, even with the so-called official poll watchers, such as the PPCRV and allied organizations right there in the area questioning this irregularity, but there was nothing they could do to stop these under aged voters from voting.

Can the Comelec under chairman Jose Melo guarantee that the voters list will be really cleaned of all these irregularities — and start it with the ARMM, as the computerization project pushes through?

And if it does, just who in the Comelec will ensure that the voters’ list is cleaned out of these fraudulent voters? The Comelec officers at the ARMM, who will be providing the information to the Manila Comelec officers-in-charge? But precisely, these are the same officers who engage in massive electoral fraud. They need a bloated registry of voters, to be able to provide the votes for the candidate that paid them off to ensure so many votes for him.

As for Metro Manila and elsewhere, in the case of the voters’ registration list, which is also bloated with double registrants, plus ghost voters, the cheating comes in with the Comelec’s deliberate disenfranchisement of voters, by scrambling the list to deny the opposition candidates the large votes from their bailiwicks then padding the voters’ list in the administration’s bailiwicks to get the desired number of votes, as it happened in 2004 and again in 2007.

It can of course be argued that 2010 is still two years away, and there is enough time to clean up the voters’ list and usher in full automation. But even such intent can hardly guarantee clean polls in 2010 and well does the Comelec know this.

For years on end, the number of voters in this country was much too high a number to be credible — as every time, more than half of the population was supposed to be registered voters, which is statistically impossible, given the fact that there are more babies born every year, which translates to our having more of the very young than the old. Yet some 55 to 60 percent of the population are said to be registered voters.

This has never been corrected by the Comelec. And there is doubt that there will be any corrections done even under chairman Melo.

Truth is, by 2010, the syndicate of cheats at the Comelec will have perfected the automated cheating.

Unless we clean up the Comelec of its cheats — massive fraud — automated this time, will rule the day.

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