Gordon junks Comelec plan to buy more OMR machines
By. Dennis Gadil – Malaya
Senator Richard Gordon on Thursday rejected as ridiculous the proposal of the Commission on Elections to use 85 percent of its budget for a fully automated election in 2010 in buying more optical mark reader (OMR) voting machines which is slower than the Direct recording Electronic (DRE) machines.
“Comelec itself has said that OMR is prone to tampering and is much slower than DRE. Going heavy on OMR in 2010 will defeat our objective of having fast and clean elections,” Gordon said.
He ordered the Comelec to revise its budget proposal for poll automation and reconfigure its purchase plans for automated counting machines. “Every step of the way we have to coax the Comelec to stay the course and not be afraid of the cost, because it is up to Congress really to produce the money. That is why they have to come back and come up with the real budget for a past and very accurate system which cannot be tampered with,” he said.
“There seems to be an attempt by certain unscrupulous people in Comelec to prevent the automation of elections by making it appear as not feasible,” he said, adding that it was ridiculous of the Comelec to submit such budget proposal.
Gordon, chair of the Joint Congressional Oversight Committee on Automated Election System, was surprised to learn during a hearing by the joint panel on poll automated that Comelec was planning to use 95 percent of its proposed p9.7 billion budget for the 2010 polls on OMR machines and only 15 percent for the DRE or touch screen voting machines.
The DREs would be used in Metro Manila, Cebu and Metro Davao. OMR requires voters to fill up a paper ballot which is then counted by a special machine as opposed to the DRE which allows voters to use a toush screen or touch pad.
The Comelec had earlier announced that it had prepared five different budget proposals for full election automation, with the highter costing p61 billion and the lowest P3.4 billion.
Senator Richard Gordon on Thursday rejected as ridiculous the proposal of the Commission on Elections to use 85 percent of its budget for a fully automated election in 2010 in buying more optical mark reader (OMR) voting machines which is slower than the Direct recording Electronic (DRE) machines.
“Comelec itself has said that OMR is prone to tampering and is much slower than DRE. Going heavy on OMR in 2010 will defeat our objective of having fast and clean elections,” Gordon said.
He ordered the Comelec to revise its budget proposal for poll automation and reconfigure its purchase plans for automated counting machines. “Every step of the way we have to coax the Comelec to stay the course and not be afraid of the cost, because it is up to Congress really to produce the money. That is why they have to come back and come up with the real budget for a past and very accurate system which cannot be tampered with,” he said.
“There seems to be an attempt by certain unscrupulous people in Comelec to prevent the automation of elections by making it appear as not feasible,” he said, adding that it was ridiculous of the Comelec to submit such budget proposal.
Gordon, chair of the Joint Congressional Oversight Committee on Automated Election System, was surprised to learn during a hearing by the joint panel on poll automated that Comelec was planning to use 95 percent of its proposed p9.7 billion budget for the 2010 polls on OMR machines and only 15 percent for the DRE or touch screen voting machines.
The DREs would be used in Metro Manila, Cebu and Metro Davao. OMR requires voters to fill up a paper ballot which is then counted by a special machine as opposed to the DRE which allows voters to use a toush screen or touch pad.
The Comelec had earlier announced that it had prepared five different budget proposals for full election automation, with the highter costing p61 billion and the lowest P3.4 billion.
Labels: 2010 election, comelec, OMR machines, senator gordon
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