A former Commission on Elections official and two poll watchdogs on Sunday supported the petition filed by the Confederation of Non-Stock Savings and Loan Associations Inc. party-list group seeking an investigation on the discrepancies in the results of the May 9 party-list election, which they said could be an indication of votes manipulation.
Former Comelec Commissioner Gregorio Larrazabal stressed that the Comelec should not dismiss outright the petition made by Consla for the sake of transparency and truthful elections.
Consla earlier asked the poll body to conduct a probe of the discrepancy of the votes it received, noting that based on the Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting’s quick count, its votes reached 342,513 on May 9, the first day of counting.
The next day, the group noted the PPCRV tally showed its votes went up to 523,753 votes at 11 a.m. and 555,896 at 12 noon to occupy Rank #14 in the tally.
However, the party- list learned that based on Comelec’s own canvassing it only garnered a total of 213,814 votes.
“When you say you’ll have transparent elections, you have to back that up with action. Otherwise, it’s just lip service,” Larrazabal pointed out.
The fact that the alleged inconsistency took place at the server managed by the Comelec and used by the PPCRV, its sole accredited citizens’ arm, makes it all the more imperative for the poll body to act on the matter, Larrazabal said.
“You need to look at it because the data sent to the transparency server is the same data sent to the various consolidation and canvassing system [CCS],” Larrazabal said.
The Reform Philippines’ Coalition headed by lawyer Glenn Chong said Consla’s case “is a strong indication” that the 2016 elections are far from being honest.
“They have screenshots of the PPCRV transparency server update showing they had garnered over 555,000votes only to be deducted by over 300,000 votes in the final/official Comelec tally,” Chong lamented.
Chong said he was baffled by the conflicting results of the tally of the PPCRV and the Comelec with regard to Consla considering that they used the same transparency server during the last elections.
“The updates of election results are always additions as there are no negative votes to justify a reduction of their already tallied votes,” Chong said.
“We join Consla in their demands for Comelec to explain the anomaly. Cases of this nature cannot be simply ignored or disregarded. They screamed for credible answers from the Comelec and Smartmatic,” the lawyer added.
The Legal Network for Truthful Elections (Lente) also expressed support for Consla’s call for an investigation into the votes manipulation in the party-list election.
Lente executive director, lawyer Rona Ann Caritos said it is the right of Consla to call for an investigation if it believes that it has sufficient evidence to prove vote manipulation in the recently concluded elections.
Caritos, said an explanation from the PPCRV and the Comelec on the supposed discrepancies would build public confidence not only on the process but also on the Comelec as a constitutional body.
When asked the repercussions of denying Consla’s demand for probe, Caritos said: “It will affect the credibility of the AES [automated election system].”
She noted that in the past, 2010 election issues were brought up in the 2013 elections due to Comelec’s failure to provide answers to various issues, particular on allegations of fraud and vote manipulation.
Larrazabal, on the other hand, has long been pushing for the audit of the Comelec’s AES.
In particular, Larrazabal has asked the commission to disclose to concerned parties the Internet Protocol (IP) address, Media Access Control (MAC) address, and Server Logs used in the last May 9 polls.
“Over a month after the elections, the Comelec and Smartmatic have not yet provided the IP and MAC addresses, and Server Logs. Why are these being withheld?” Larrazabal asked.
Aside from asking the Comelec to conduct an investigation, Consla through its lawyer Rodolfo San Diego has also filed a letter-complaint with the PPCRV seeking an explanation for the discrepancy.
The group anchored its claim of vote manipulation during the last elections on various documents and statements made by witnesses which include a representative from its fellow party-list group, Buhay.
In his sworn-affidavit, Arnold Arriola, Buhay’s partylist candidate, attested that Consla’s number of votes had reached 342, 513 as of 10:40 pm of May 9 with 68,262 clustered precincts counted or roughly 74.18 percent of all clustered precincts and was ranked number 17 among contending party-list organisations.
Consla’s first nominee Retired Col. Ricardo L. Nolasco Jr., of the Philippine Air Force, in an earlier statement, said both Comelec and PPCRV are duty-bound to explain not only to its supporters but also to the Filipino people the discrepancy in their canvassing of votes for the sake of transparency.
“How can votes canvassed by the Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting [PPCRV] from the Comelec Transparency Server, which essentially are the same votes canvassed by the Comelec in its official canvass, churn out completely different results?” Nolasco, a multi-awarded and bemedalled officer who served the military for almost 30 years, asked.
