House allots P500-M for 2016 poll result transmission

MANILA, Philippines - The House of Representatives decided yesterday to give the Commission on Elections (Comelec) additional funds to cover the cost of electronically transmitting votes in next year’s elections from the precinct level to various canvassing centers.

“We have agreed in the appropriations committee to allocate P500 million for the transmission of votes. We have the go-signal of the Speaker on this,” Davao City Rep. Isidro Ungab, committee chairman, said.

He said the Comelec had requested P600 million for setting up a communications backbone to be used in sending votes from the clustered precincts to the tabulation centers in the district, town, provincial and city levels, and to the Comelec main office and Congress.

“They can source the difference of P100 million and the additional funds they need from their savings,” he said.

He added that the additional P500 million would be included in the funding for the May 9, 2016 elections in the proposed P3.002-trillion national budget for next year.

The Department of Budget and Management, Quirino Rep. Dakila Cua, Ungab’s vice chairman in charge of the Comelec budget and Cagayan de Oro City Rep. Rufus Rodriguez, to whom the Comelec has forwarded a separate funding request, endorsed the allocation of funds for vote transmission.

The poll body’s additional funding request totaled P1.240 billion: P600 million for the transmission of votes, P450 million for honoraria, P150 million for detailed engineering plans for its new building, P30 million for overseas absentee voting and P10 million as appropriation cover for the construction of the new building.

Aside from the P500 million, Ungab said his committee approved the additional P30 million for absentee voting and P2 million as budgetary cover for the new Comelec building.

“They have about P3 billion in savings for their new building. They need only the budget authorization. They are allowed to augment the P2-million initial funding,” he said.

He said it is not easy for the House and the Senate to give additional funds to any agency, since the money would have to be taken from other state offices or appropriations.

“This is a delicate balancing act. The gain of one agency or program is the loss of another. That is why we choose only the projects, programs or activities for which funds are critically needed, like the transmission of votes in next year’s elections,” he stressed.

Isabela Rep. Rodolfo Albano III, who has attended hearings on the proposed 2016 budget, said the Comelec should have anticipated their funding requirement for the electronic transmission of votes.

“They should have included it in their original budget request,” he said.

He said the poll body should aim for 100-percent transmittal and accounting of votes, instead of just 76 percent as what happened in the 2013 midterm elections.