SC to Comelec: Carry out Puerto Princesa recall elections

The High Court cites the Commission on Elections' fiscal autonomy and the chairman's power to augment items in its budget from savings to fund the exercise

MANILA, Philippines (UPDATED) – The Supreme Court has ordered the Commission on Elections (Comelec) to conduct recall elections against Puerto Princesa City Mayor Lucilo Bayron.

Voting 12-0 on Tuesday, November 25, the Supreme Court en banc ruled in favor of petitioner Alroben Goh and set aside two Comelec resolutions that suspended all proceedings on pending recall petitions, including that in Puerto Princesa, due to lack of funds.

"We hold that the Comelec committed grave abuse of discretion in issuing Resolution Nos. 9864 and 9882," the SC decision said.

The Court cited the Comelec's fiscal autonomy, and the Comelec chairman's power to augment items in its budget from its savings. There is no need, therefore, to secure a supplemental budget from Congress to conduct recall elections in 2014, it said.

It also pointed to an existing line item appropriation in the 2014 national budget – in the "Programs" category of the poll body's budget – for the conduct of recall polls, which is among Comelec's constitutional mandates.

"Should the funds in the 2014 budget be deemed insufficient, the Comelec chairman "may exercise his authority to augment such line item appropriation from the Comelec's existing savings, as this augmentation is expressly authorized in the 2014 [General Appropriations Act]," the SC ruling said.

The Comelec has yet to receive a copy of the Court's decision as of posting time.

Goh, former Puerto Princesa City administrator, filed the recall petition against Bayron before the Comelec early this year, citing the "loss of trust and confidence" in him as city mayor. (Fast Facts: The recall process)

In April, through Comelec Resolution No. 9864, the Comelec certified the sufficiency of the petition, but suspended any proceeding in furtherance thereof – including the verification of signatures on the petition and the conduct of the recall election itself – due to lack of funds.

The following month, the Comelec issued Resolution No. 9882, suspending all proceedings on recall petitions until the funding issue is resolved.

On November 21, the poll body resumed taking up recall petitions by partially lifting its suspension order. In the case of the Puerto Princesa petition, the Comelec allowed Goh's request to publish the petition for 3 weeks. – Rappler.com

ER Ejercito ousted as Laguna governor

The Supreme Court has ruled to oust Laguna governor Emilio Ramon “ER” Ejercito.

The ruling affirmed the Commission on Elections (Comelec) order removing him from his post for overspending during the May 2013 polls.

During Tuesday’s regular deliberation of the SC en banc, with a unanimous vote of 12 Justices, it finally closed the door on the Laguna governor.

“The court, voting 12-0, [has] denied the petition filed by petitioner Emilio Ramon ‘ER’ Ejercito It thus upheld the May 1, 2014 resolution of public respondent Comelec en banc in SPA No. 13-306, which in turn upheld the September 26, 2013 resolution of the Comelec First Division which granted the petition for disqualification filed by private respondent Edgar San Luis,” the SC ruled.

Associate Justices Arturo Brion and Estela Perlas-Bernabe were on leave while Associate Justice Francis Jardeleza took no part for he entered the case when he was still the Solicitor General.

In its resolution, the Comelec ruled that Ejercito should be ousted from office for going beyond the campaign spending limit of P4.5 million.

He spent P23.56 million during the May 2013 gubernatorial race.

Ejercito said the mode of complaint filed by San Luis is erroneous since what was filed was for prosecution of election offenses, not a disqualification case.

He added that a disqualification case is a different proceeding and as such he is entitled to due process.

Ejercito also questioned the evidence presented against him—an advertising contract between ABS-CBN Broadcasting Corp. And Scenema Concept Intl. Inc.—which was not formally offered as evidence before the election court.

Also, he said he cannot be made liable for acts of a third party.

But all of these arguments were not bitten by the High Court.

source:  Manila Times

Ignoring the hard question

During the September 18, 2014 meeting of the Joint Congressional Oversight Committee (JCOC) on the Automated Election System, I handed over a letter from Transparent Elections.org.ph to Atty.Himerio Garcia, who is the JCOC-AES Committee Secretary at the Senate. The letter was addressed to the committee, through Sen. Aquilino Pimentel III, the committee’s chairman for the Senate.

Here’s the body of the letter:

“TransparentElections.org.ph is a group of mostly Information Technology (IT) practitioners who have had many years of experience in running the automated parallel counts of Namfrel. In 2006, a few of us were also invited to participate in the Technical Working Group that assisted the Senate in crafting the automation law, R.A. 9369. At this stage of the hearings, there are three issues that we would like to bring up to the Joint Congressional Oversight Committee (JCOC).

1. During the JCOC hearing of August 14, 2014, I asked the following question of the COMELEC:

Why does the COMELEC want to spend P18 billion on PCOS which only shortens the election process by half-a-day, yet removes the transparency in precinct-counting and seriously impairs the protest process. Certainly, the COMELEC knows that it is the automation of canvassing that shortens the process by some five weeks or so.

The only response I have heard so far – and this was from Chairman Brillantes – was that manual precinct-counting is not allowed by the automation law. We beg to disagree. The law says that the COMELEC is authorized to use an automated election system for the process of voting, counting of votes, and canvassing/consolidation and transmission of results. Surely, the chairman knows the difference between “authorized” and “mandated”. (Further explanation is given in the attached article.) We would like to hear valid answers and arguments from the COMELEC. It is only fair that they explain to the taxpaying public why they want to spend that large amount just to save twelve hours in the process.

2. In the resolution that was read by Chairman Louis Casambre of the COMELEC Advisory Council during a previous JCOC hearing, I take it that the CAC basically concurs with the COMELEC’s choice of technology for 2016, even as it allows for the testing of other technologies in the same election. We would like to request from them for a copy of the working papers they used in analyzing the various technologies available and arriving at what they believe could be the most appropriate one for 2016. We can provide the JCOC and the CAC a copy of our working papers, should they so require. The CAC has several IT practitioners as members and we would like to find out how our two conclusions—theirs and ours—could be so far apart, in fact, value-wise, more than P13 billion apart. This is such a huge amount that we believe it is worth it for JCOC to spend some time in investigating the details of the CAC’s, and our analyses. We might be wrong; or, they could be wrong. The taxpaying public would surely want to find out which one is right.

3. We are not vendors of election systems. But we know of a very simple, yet most appropriate, and very transparent system for the automation of our elections. We are offering this solution to the COMELEC, free of charge. We would like to be given a chance to present to the JCOC such system that will only cost the country P4 billion, maybe P5 billion maximum. Certainly, far, very far, from the P18 billion budget that the COMELEC is asking for. We would be ready to present it in the next JCOC hearing, if the Chairman will allow us.

(Just a point of comparison: The potential savings of more than P13 billion can provide some 130,000 houses to Yolanda victims @P100,000); or, enough fishing boats for fishermen and equipment for tradesmen who lost their only means of livelihood during the storm.)

Having shown how huge the numbers are, we are hoping that our requests would merit the approval of the Committee. Thank you.”

* * *

It is likely that newspaper columnists favoring the Smartmatic solution will argue that even the CAC endorses PCOS. This is the reason why we are now asking CAC for a copy of their working papers. It would be very interesting to find out how they justified their position. There’s a strong possibility that they are taking the easy way out by simply concurring with what Comelec wants. If so, then that would be betrayal of the public’s trust. (A little birdie told me that there wasn’t even the usual tabulation of pros and cons of each alternative technology.) By the way, the figure that’s being mentioned lately is P16 billion, not P18 billion. Whichever is correct, the number is still huge!

The last JCOC meeting was on September 18, 2014. The next meeting has not been scheduled yet. This is worrisome considering that Comelec seems bent on conducting the bidding BEFORE the scheduled retirement of Chairman Brillantes, Commissioners Tagle and Yusoph on February 2, 2015.

What’s the big hurry? For the 2010 elections, the contract was signed in July, 2009—less than a year before the May, 2010 elections. And that was the first time PCOS was going to be used!

source:  Manila Times Column of Gus Lagman, Former COMELEC Commissioner

Fast Facts: The recall process

MANILA, Philippines – The power to recall a local elective official due to loss of confidence shall be exercised by registered voters of the local government unit (LGU) where the official serves. Any provincial, city, municipal, or barangay official may be subjected to a recall.

No recall proceedings can take place within a year from the date of the local officials' assumption of office and within a year before a regular local election. Since a term for local officials consists of 3 years, this limits the initiation of recall proceedings within their second year in office.

The recall process begins with the collection of signatures from supporters of the recall petition. Upon reaching a sufficient number of signatures, the petitioners should formally file the recall petition before the Commission on Elections (Comelec).

The poll body would verify the signatures and, once the petition is determined as sufficient in form and substance, set a date for the recall election.

If the local official loses the election, he or she is ousted from office.

These are the required number of petitioners for a recall petition, according to the Local Government Code:

Voting Population in LGU	Required Percentage/Number of Petitioners
Less than 20,000	At least 25%
20,000 - 74,999	At least 20%, but not less than 5,000
75,000 - 299,999	At least 15%, but not less than 15,000
More than 300,000	At least 10%, but not less than 45,000

There are additional restrictions set by the Local Government Code:

• A local official may be subjected to a recall election only once during his term of office.
• While the recall process is ongoing, the local official sought to be recalled cannot resign.

There was previously an option for a "preparatory recall assembly" to initiate the recall. It was composed of elected officials in the LGU concerned. A provincial recall assembly, for example, consists of all the mayors, vice mayors, and councilors in the province.

But the preparatory recall assembly was discontinued in 2004, following amendments in the Local Government Code through Republic Act 9244.

Past petitions, election

From 2010 to 2012, there were 38 recall petitions filed before the Comelec, but not one resulted in an actual recall election.

These include recall petitions against Samar Governor Sharee Ann Tan and Vice Governor Stephen James Tan in 2010, and Palawan Governor Abraham Khalil Mitra in 2011.

Nine mayors, 7 vice mayors, 18 city and municipal councilors, and a barangay captain were sought to be recalled during that period.

Year	Local Gov't Unit	Official(s) Sought to be Recalled
2010	Samar	Governor Sharee Ann Tan
		Vice Governor Stephen James Tan
2011	Bani, Pangasinan	Mayor Marcelo Navarro
		Vice Mayor Filipina Rivera
		Councilors Rosalinda Acenas, Ruben Ampler, Tamerlane Olores, and Cothera Gwen Yamamoto
	San Manuel, Tarlac	Vice Mayor Emmalyn Rillera
		Councilor Melvin Malazo
	Palawan	Governor Abraham Kahlil Mitra
	Rizal, Palawan	Mayor Nicolas Montaño, Sr.
	Roxas, Palawan	Mayor Ma. Angela Sabando
	Pasacao, Camarines Sur	Mayor Asuncion Arceño
		Councilor Niño Tayco
	Cortes, Bohol	Vice Mayor Danilo Montero
	Danao City, Cebu	Mayor Ramon Durano Jr
		Vice Mayor Ramon Durano III
		Councilors Marilou Camaongay-Flores, Jorge John Cane, Cynthia Duterte, Jovilina Enriquez, Alejandro Lawas, Miguel Antonio Magpale, Carmen Remedios Meca, Roland Reyes, and Jose Thaddeus Roble Jr
	Samboan, Cebu	Vice Mayor Rogelio Capa
		Councilor Jeffrey Catipay
	Rajah Buayan, Maguindanao	Mayor Yacob Lumenda Ampatuan
	Simunul, Tawi-Tawi	Mayor Nazif Ahmas Bayo Abdurrahman
2012	Gapan City, Nueva Ecija	Mayor Christian Tinio
		Vice Mayor Rodel Matias
		Councilors Marcelino Alvarez and Eliser Padiernos
	Dumaran, Palawan	Mayor Medwin Pablico
	El Nido, Palawan	Vice Mayor Edgardo Trinidad
	Brgy. Kemdeng, San Vicente, Palawan	Barangay Captain Daniel Latube

These petitions are now deemed cancelled because of the 2013 midterm elections.

As of September 2014, there are 5 pending recall petitions before the Comelec.

Meanwhile, the last recall election in the country took place more than a decade ago, on April 26, 2003, in Agoo, La Union. The municipal recall assembly sought to recall Vice Mayor Ramil Lopez for "wanton neglect of duties."

Councilor Sheila Milo ran against Lopez and defeated him in that election. – Rappler.com

The PCOS accuracy requirement

Comelec prescribed an accuracy rate of 99.995 percent as a response to the requirement of the Election Automation Law that the automated election system perform accurately. This was included in the technical specifications of the PCOS enumerated in the Request for Proposal for the Automation of the 2010 National and Local Elections issued by the Comelec. This requirement is interpreted to mean that a discrepancy of one vote out of 20,000 vote marks between a manual count and PCOS count is acceptable.

In evaluating the PCOS eventually used in the 2010 and 2013 elections, the Comelec conducted a simple test of the machine using a few hundred test ballots with a total of 20,000 vote marks. Having found no discrepancy between the manual count and the PCOS count, the Special Bids and Awards Committee declared the PCOS machine 100 percent accurate.

As required by law, an audit of the PCOS in randomly selected clustered precincts was conducted after the close of election operations on election day. This audit activity is referred to as Random Manual Audit (RMA).

The reported PCOS accuracy rate in 2010 was 99.6 percent or a discrepancy of 80 votes out of 20,000 vote marks between the manual count and PCOS count. In 2013 it was 99.9747 percent or a discrepancy of 5 votes for every 20,000 vote marks between the manual count and PCOS count.

But in both 2010 and 2013 the RMA Team (RMAT) arbitrarily set aside the required 99.995 percent accuracy rate declaring that “Based on ninety-nine percent (99 percent) accuracy rate, the allowable margin of variance was set at one percent (equivalent to less than 10 votes’ difference in absolute value for every 1,000 valid votes counted).” This led me to think: How did the RMAT determine the accuracy rate of 99 percent? What data did the RMAT base it on?

Well, trawling the internet for information, I found a company (http://www.abbyy.com/) that specializes in mark recognition technologies, including optical mark recognition, which is the underlying technology in the PCOS. The company must have a basis to declare and publish a 99.995 percent accuracy rate of its products. That basis must have been the results gathered from exhaustive tests of its products.

In setting aside the 99.995 percent accuracy rate, the 2013 RMAT explained that “Since most of the ‘variance’ can be attributed to human errors or clerical errors, aiming for a higher accuracy rate to as high as 99.995 percent (i.e. 1 vote difference in absolute value for 20,000 valid votes counted) could be statistically improbable.” Revealing. Does it mean that rather than simply assessing the accuracy of the PCOS, the RMAT aimed to match the 99.995 percent accuracy rate? The 2010 and 2013 RMA Reports show that the RMAT went through several iterations when it found that the manual count and PCOS count differed by at least 10 votes Failing to meet its goal, it declared the 99.995 percent accuracy rate statistically improbable to match.

Let’s look at the potential impact of a 99 percent accuracy rate vis-à-vis a 99.995 percent accuracy rate. Let’s assume 52 million registered voters. Let us also assume that 80 percent went to the voting precincts to vote. This means that on election day 41.6 million voters actually voted. Let us further assume that all of them voted for a president or vice president. An accuracy rate of 99 percent, using our assumed numbers, would mean a discrepancy of 416,000 votes between the manual count and the PCOS count. On the other hand, an accuracy rate of 99.995 percent translates to a discrepancy of 2,080 votes between the manual count and the PCOS count. 416,000 vote vis-à-vis 2,080 vote is an ocean of a difference!

Let’s Face IT! The numbers have spoken and numbers don’t lie. The PCOS accuracy findings in the 2010 and 2013 RMA are obviously below the 99.995 percent accuracy rate set by Comelec. The RMAT conveniently avoided to explicitly and unequivocally declare that the PCOS counts did not meet the accuracy rate requirement. Instead, the RMAT, without any basis, lowered the accuracy bar to 99 percent to show that the PCOS accuracy rates in 2010 and 2013 RMA are better than its prescribed level.

Unacceptable!

source: Manila Times Column of Lito Averia

Comelec slams door on Aquino term extension

THE Commission on Elections (Comelec) on Tuesday shot down plans to amend the Constitution to pave the way for President Benigno Aquino 3rd to extend his term beyond 2016, saying there is no more time to tinker with the Charter.

Comelec Chairman Sixto Brillantes Jr. said the national elections will proceed in 2016 because the only way for the electoral exercise to be postponed is through Charter change.

“Whatever happens, there is no way that there can be no elections. There may be some adjustments, but we will have elections in 2016,” the Comelec chief told reporters after attending a hearing by the Senate committee on finance on the proposed P16.9-billion budget of the poll body for 2015.

Brillantes said the Comelec has been preparing for the 2016 elections.

The United Nationalist Alliance (UNA) earlier accused Malacañang of floating a no- election scenario as part of attempts to extend the term of the President.

Aquino, in a television interview, had said he is open to Charter change or Cha-cha to allow him to seek another term.

But Brillantes said Congress cannot suspend the elections in 2016 because that would be unconstitutional.

”The only way to stop the elections is to amend the Constitution. I don’t think there is time to amend the Constitution,” the Comelec chairman noted.

UNA Secretary General Toby Tiangco claimed that the recent remarks of Malacañang spokesperson Edwin Lacierda on the possibility of a “no-election” scenario in 2016 reflect efforts of the Aquino administration and the Roxas-Abad (Manual Roxas 2nd-Florencio Abad) faction in the ruling Liberal Party (LP) to derail democratic processes in order to perpetuate Aquino in power.

The opposition believes that the dismal showing of their 2016 bets in the surveys is the reason why the administration has floated term extension through Cha-cha.

Meanwhile, Brillantes said the poll body will be using Optical Mark Reader (OMR) system technology in the 2016 elections. OMR employs the same technology used by the precinct count optical scan (PCOS) machines.

The poll body is also planning to use the PCOS machines that were used in the 2013 elections. The Comelec chief, however, stressed the need to procure 6,000 additional counting machines to augment the 80,000 machines in its inventory.

Stop Cha-cha debates
At the House of Representatives, an ally of the President sought the suspension of debates on constitutional amendments that seek to lift the 40-percent restriction on foreign ownership of public utilities.

Rep. Walden Bello of Akbayan party-list made the call during his interpellation of Rep. Mylene Garcia-Albano, who defended a resolution calling for economic amendments in her capacity as the chairman of the committee on constitutional amendments.

Bello said lawmakers should stop their debates on the issue since the government is yet to solve the country’s land distribution and titling problems. He cited the uncompleted Cadastral Survey in 1913 that would have determined boundaries of each city, municipality and province as stated by the President in his fifth State of the Nation Address (SONA) in July.

“This [Charter change] will make it more difficult to address this problem. It is pretty clear that this seeks to undermine, if not subvert, the constitutional ban on foreign ownership of land. We should really postpone this for practical reasons. We should not put the cart before the horse,” Bello pointed out.

Albano-Garcia, however, disagreed, saying the completion of the Cadastral Survey is already being addressed by the Aquino administration.

“Our objective here is not to grant full foreign ownership of land. We just want to allow Congress to have certain flexibility in formulating economic policies and give some leeway to government to address the exigencies of the times. I don’t agree that we should hold this in abeyance while other problems are being addressed by the executive department,” she added.

But Bello refused to back down, saying China and Vietnam managed to score economic growth despite a constitutional ban on foreign ownership of land, among others.

“These are the two of the most dynamic economies in East Asia. The ban on foreign ownership is not a hindrance to development and the foreign investors have learned to live with it and move forward,” the lawmaker noted.

But Garcia-Albano countered that China’s ban on foreign ownership is not really absolute since it allows foreigners to lease land for as long as 99 years.

source:  Manila Times

TV networks and election spending

NO ONE really ever talks about advertising spending during elections - first because it’s a highly regulated activity understood only by a small number of political consultants; and second because it’s a bit of a dark art, built around finding ways to skirt the COMELEC’s rules creatively.

This need to be creative in the face of regulatory vigilance explains why every election season sees politicians appearing on every advertising platform imaginable, from cans of tuna to the backs of buses, posing as product endorsers rather than candidates. In recent years they have also turned in large numbers to social media, their supporters doing the heavy lifting of sharing across their friends networks to get the message out.

But any politician with national ambitions will need to advertise on television at some point, and television is the weak point in the political establishment’s attempts to keep spending under wraps. That is because local television happens to be dominated by two networks, both of them listed companies obliged to disclose their financial statements. And when these networks’ profits drop in non-election years, they will not hesitate to blame “the absence of election spending” for the decline. From their publicly-available disclosures, it is thus possible to quantify the impact of election ads on their financial results, as we shall see from the chart below.

The first obvious takeaway from the chart is that election spending doesn’t seem to affect revenue much. Ad slots are finite, after all; you can only squeeze so much advertising airtime from so many hours in a day. The sharpest practitioners know this, and have found ways to show you advertising at the slightest pretext. If for instance you’ve ever seen a UAAP game on television, ABS-CBN will show you sponsored moments with every steal, every block, every fast break. But at the end of the day, there are only so many slots to fill, so the game becomes finding ways to make ads as profitable for the network as possible. 

That seems to be what happened in the last election season. A look at the chart shows that on the profit level, election spending had a far more dramatic impact than revenue. The picture that emerges is that election ad income falls directly to the bottom line as pure profit. Thus GMA Network’s profit dropped by about half in the year since we last went to the polls. ABS-CBN, meanwhile, performed its own analysis and concluded that the impact of election spending was nearly P728 million, significantly larger than the profit it booked from non-election activities.


source:  Businessworld

Grace Padaca being eased out of Comelec

PRESIDENT Benigno Aquino 3rd is no longer inclined to reappoint former Isabela governor Grace Padaca to the Commission on Elections (Comelec) after her confirmation, along with those of two other poll body officials, was bypassed by the powerful Commission on Appointments (CA) recently.
Padaca, according to an unimpeachable source of The Manila Times, is not likely to get another ad interim appointment from the President because she has pending cases at the Office of the Ombudsman and the Sandiganbayan.

“She failed to file her SALN [statement of assets liabilities and net worth] for three years when she was still governor. She has also a graft case,” the source said.

The Times tried to get the reaction of Presidential Communications Secretary Herminio Coloma Jr. and Malacañang spokesman Edwin Lacierda but the officials were mum on the issue. Coloma, in a text message, said he will have to verify Padaca’s status with the Office of the President.

Prior to the sine die adjournment of Congress, the CA did not act on the appointments of Padaca and Comelec Commissioners Louie Tito Guia and Al Parreño. Padaca’s term will only expire on February 2, 2018 because she is serving the remaining term of former Commissioner Augusto Lagman.
Parreño replaced Commissioner Rene Sarmiento while Guia replaced Armando Velasco.

The President will have to reappoint the officials, who will again be subjected to CA scrutiny in the next Congress.

Earlier this year, the Office of the Ombudsman asked the Sandiganbayan to proceed with the trial of Padaca, who is facing charges of malversation and graft.

The graft case stemmed from Padaca’s awarding of a P25-million grant to the Economic Development for Western Isabela and Northern Luzon Foundation Inc. that was disbursed without the concurrence or approval of the Isabela provincial board when she was Isabela governor.

Padaca entered a plea of not guilty on October 22, 2013. She had sought the dismissal of the charges claiming immunity from suit. Her lawyers said when Aquino appointed Padaca to the Comelec on October 2, 2012, she automatically enjoys the protection of Sections 2 and 3, Article 11 of the 1987 Constitution. The provision states that she is already an impeachable officer and only the House of Representatives has the exclusive power to do that.

But Ombudsman prosecutors argued that the former governor cannot hide behind her supposed immunity because the criminal charges were filed before her appointment to the poll body.

The Sandiganbayan also argued that such immunity could lead to an “abuse of political power of appointment” to insulate public officials from liability.


source:  Manila Times