CHAIRMAN Jose Melo of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) hinted on Wednesday that poll automation in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) may not push through, as the commission is way behind its schedule to modernize the region’s August elections.

Melo, who took the chairmanship of the Comelec last week, said the poll body should have awarded the automation project to the winning bidders by April 1 to prepare for the ARMM elections in August this year.

The Comelec’s technical advisory council proposed two technologies to be used in the ARMM polls, the direct recording electronic system (DRE) and the optical media reader (OMR). The DRE system would be used in Maguindanao, while the OMR is intended for the rest of the region.

Only one company, South America-based Smartmatic Sahi Joint Venture, qualified in the Comelec’s eligibility requirements for DRE, while another company, Sandz Solutions, failed to meet the conditions for OMR in March.

“If there is no successful bidder, what’s the consequence? The consequence is we cannot computerize the August elections in the ARMM,” Melo told reporters in an interview Wednesday.

He added that in order to computerize the ARMM elections, the exercise should be moved to November to give the Comelec enough time to prepare for automation.

“But in order to move or postpone the elections, you need congressional action, which is very difficult,” he explained.

While admitting “we’re running out of time” to computerize the ARMM polls, Melo, however, expressed optimism that something could be worked out as the Comelec’s technical advisory council meets with the joint congressional oversight committee, headed by Sen. Richard Gordon and PDP-Laban Rep. Teodoro Locsin Jr. of Makati, on Thursday.

The ARMM polls would have been the country’s first modernized election since the approval of the automation law in 1989.

In 1996, the Comelec bought more than 50 machines for the ARMM polls but these were not used after experts declared them defective.

In 2004, a few months before the presidential elections, the Supreme Court stopped the Comelec from using close to 2,000 counting machines after the justices agreed that bidding irregularities were committed when the P1.3 billion project was awarded to the Mega Pacific eSolutions Inc.

None of the officials of the seven-member commission was ever penalized for the 2004 botched poll automation until all of them have already retired starting last year.

P1.1B ‘missing’ in government swine program

WHILE the crisis spawned by the $329-million national broadband network (NBN) scandal remains a threat to the survival of the Arroyo administration, another can of worms was opened that allegedly robbed marginalized farmers once more of at least P1.1 billion of public funds.

CIVIL-society and faith-based groups are considering Chief Justice Reynato Puno as a replacement for former President Corazon Aquino in their campaign to push for President Arroyo’s resignation.

LEADERS and representatives of various civil society, farmers, urban poor, labor and fishermen’s groups held the People’s Food Summit at the UP Diliman’s School of Labor and Industrial Relations (Solair) on Wednesday to tackle the issue of food security and come up with an alternative solution to the looming food crisis haunting the Philippines.

THE Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) elected Muslimin Sema as its new chairman on Tuesday in a move aimed at strengthening the fragile peace in Mindanao.

CHAIRMAN Jose Melo of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) hinted on Wednesday that poll automation in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) may not push through, as the commission is way behind its schedule to modernize the region’s August elections.

CHIEF Justice Reynato Puno has directed the Office of the Court Administrator to take action on the request of Steel Corp.  of the Philippines (SCP) to have its rehabilitation case transferred from Branch 2 of the Regional Trial Court (RTC) in Batangas City to any court in Metro Manila.

THE head of the antifraud and commercial crime division (AFCCD) of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) on Wednesday warned businessmen to obey intellectual property laws or else the government would run after them and even seize their goods.

A LEGISLATOR urged President Arroyo on Wednesday to appoint a deputy Ombudsman in the Department of Agriculture (DA) who will serve as a tripwire against misdeeds as billions of pesos are heading the agency’s way.