Comelec opens public bidding for automated election system today

MANILA, Philippines - The Commission on Elections (Comelec) opens today the public bidding process for the automated election system (AES) to be used in the 2016 polls.

Comelec spokesman James Jimenez said they would publish the invitation for public bidding. 

“For those of you keeping score, preparations for the 2016 national and local elections will begin,” Jimenez said. 

He said the bid is open to all potential service providers.     

The Comelec will use the existing precinct count optical scan (PCOS) machines of Smartmatic and a secondary optical mark reader (OMR) technology for the 2016 presidential polls.

About 40,000 units of the secondary OMR technology are being eyed to supplement the already Comelec-owned 80,000 PCOS units.

The poll body is also set to pilot test the direct recording electronic (DRE) and the Internet voting systems in 2016.

Two hundred DRE machines are expected to be used in the next elections and will be pilot-tested in highly urbanized areas. 

As the Comelec starts the bidding process, calls were raised for the blacklisting of Smartmatic International.

Information technology expert Jun Estrella urged the Comelec to disallow the multinational company to participate again in the bidding for the 2016 AES.

He said the poll body should not allow the AES supplier in the 2010 and 2013 polls to have a role again in the 2016 elections.

“There are sufficient grounds to disqualify and blacklist Smartmatic from participating in the forthcoming bidding,” he said. 

 Among the grounds cited by Estrella were the absence of an ISO 9001 certification of Smartmatic as required by the Comelec Special Bids and Awards Committee (SBAC) and the Government Procurement Reform Act requirement since the one submitted by Smartmatic in 2010 belonged to a Taiwan-based firm, Jarltech International.