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FERDINAND T. RAFANAN
1The election returns must contain the digital signatures of the teachers who administered the voting. What are election returns? These are the documents where the number of votes obtained by each candidate at the precinct level is recorded. They are printed in hard copies and they also exist as electronic data.
After printing, the same figures are transmitted electronically to the:
1 a) municipal or city board of canvassers, b) Comelec central server, and c) another server for the citizens arm, political parties, and mass media. These transmitted results should likewise carry the same digital signatures plus the identity of the sending machine.
What is a digital signature? In computing, it is the “electronic proof of a person’s identity involving the use of encryption; used to authenticate documents.” (Dictionary.com) When the election returns electronically reach the municipal or city board of canvassers and they are canvassed, the statement of votes where they now appear and the certificate of canvass where they are totalled should contain the digital signatures of the members of the board of canvassers. Republic Act 9369 provides that “the election return transmitted electronically and digitally signed shall be considered as official election results and shall be used as the basis for the canvassing of votes and the proclamation of a candidate.”
There were no digital signatures in the last elections. It is good that the authenticity of the election returns and statement of votes were not assailed, and we have a President who won overwhelmingly without question.
2. The machine to be used should have the capability to distinguish genuine ballots from the fake ones. For this purpose, it should be able to read ultra-violet markings, bar codes, and/or other distinguishing signs. In the May 10, 2010 elections, the machines failed to read the BEGIN BOLDultra-violet markingsEND BOLD on the ballots reportedly due to some ink-related problems. It is very important to know who was responsible for the machine’s failure because Comelec advanced the expenses amounting to about P30 million to remedy the failure.
3. Since the names of candidates in an automated election have to be printed on the ballots, it is required that candidates file their certificates early. However, the law allows substitution of candidates until midday of election. Hence, the name of the original candidate appearing on the printed ballot cannot be removed and replaced with the name of the substitute candidate anymore if the substitution takes place after printing. Republic Act 9006 provides:
“Sec. 12. Substitution of Candidates.— In case of valid substitutions after the official ballots have been printed, the votes cast for the substituted candidates shall be considered as stray votes but shall not invalidate the whole ballot. For this purpose, the official ballots shall provide spaces where the voters may write the name of the substitute candidates if they are voting for the latter: Provided, however, That if the substitute candidate is of the same family name, this provision shall not apply.”
It has been very difficult to comply with this legal provision. One proposed solution that must be studied is that for every position to be voted for, there must be in the ballot extra three numbers with ovals and corresponding blank lines reserved for substitutes, so that even without their names printed they can campaign for the number assigned to them. Another solution is to disallow substitution altogether.
4. The voter in the May 10, 2010 elections shaded the ovals corresponding to the candidate of his choice but the shade he made would not be counted if it covered less than half of the oval. This rule embodied in Rule 20, Section 6(h) of the Rules of Procedure for the RTC promulgated by the Supreme Court has become the paramount rule. This overrides another rule which delares: “the votes are presumed to have been made by the voter.” It also overrides the following rule: “In looking at the shades or marks used to register votes the revision committee shall bear in mind that the will of the voters reflected as votes in the ballots shall as much as possible be given effect, setting technicalities aside.”
This is triumph of technical rules over the voter’s intent, a victory of procedure over substance, unnecessarily brought about by automation. It appears to collide with established jurisprudence and law on the matter. The 1939 doctrine of the Supreme Court in the case of Moya v Del Fierro expressed it so well: “Republicanism, in so far as it implies the adoption of a representative type of government, necessarily points to the enfranchised citizen as a particle of popular sovereignty and as the ultimate source of the established authority. He has a voice in his Government and whenever called upon to act in justifiable cases, to give it efficacy and not to stifle it . . . . no technical rule or rules should be permitted to defeat the intention of the voter, if that intention is discoverable from the ballot itself, not from evidence aliunde [Editor’s note: From a source extrinsic to the matter, document, or instrument under consideration. Latin “from elsewhere.”]
Maybe, we should consider as valid all markings inside, touching or beside the oval no matter how small, provided it is of the same ink as all other unquestioned vote marks, unless there is a bigger mark on another oval for the same position in which case the latter alone shall be counted, provided there are only two such marks. If there are more than two such marks for a single position, no vote shall be counted, as in all other cases of over vote, because then the voter’s intent cannot be determined.
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