Metro Manila (CNN Philippines) — The next national polls are just over nine months away — but the Commission on Elections (Comelec) has yet to decide whether to refurbish 81,896 precinct count optical scan (PCOS) machines or to lease 70,977 new optical mark reader (OMR) machines.
On Wednesday (July 29), the House Committee on Suffrage and Electoral Reforms told Comelec that leasing new machines appeared to be the better option.
“The members are inclined to recommend that Comelec just lease over 70,000 new machines because it is more expensive to keep refurbishing old machines,” said Rep. Frenedil Castro, committee chairperson.
It will cost Comelec P7.8 billion to lease new OMRs.
Comelec Chairman Andres Bautista said the committee in charge of the bidding process recommended Smartmatic to be the supplier.
Smartmatic was the only bidder left — after its competitor was disqualified for submitting the wrong documents.
On the other hand, Comelec will only have to spend a maximum of P3.1 billion to refurbish the PCOS machines. But this is on top of the roughly P7 billion it took to lease and then buy them.
The poll body is repeating the refurbishment bidding on Saturday (August 1) because no company was willing to take on the project for P2 billion, which was the ceiling price originally set by Comelec.
Smartmatic is expected to place a bid this time. The London-based company is poised to win a separate contract for the lease of 23,000 new OMRs.
Bayan Muna Rep. Neri Colmenares finds it suspicious that Smartmatic appears to be the contender for all contracts.
“Comelec seems to be obsessed with automation and getting Smartmatic as the contractor despite the fact that Smartmatic has had a bad track record in past elections,” Colmenares said.
But Bautista said the problems with PCOS machines were few and isolated — and besides, very few companies are presenting alternatives.
“The 2010 and 2013 elections were, by and large, good. And with regard to Smartmatic, how can we have competition when few companies appear to be interested,” Bautista noted.
The poll body knows it needs to decide and act fast.
Senior Elections Commissioner Robert Lim said the winning contractor wil need months to manufacture or refurbish the machines.
The machines will need to be tested in laboratories and then in the field.
It also takes months to customize the software and then test it several times.
Comelec plans to hold mock elections by mid-January, so an initial batch of machines should be ready by then.
The poll body’s next step hinges on the success of its bidding for PCOS refurbishment — which is still the first choice, for now.
If bidding fails, Comelec said they can either negotiate or hire a contractor directly, or if those still don’t work out, they will have to lease new machines.
