Category: aquino admin

praning about PCOS

praning, that  is, paranoid, about those blasted PCOS machines for the 2013, maybe also the 2016? elections.  my beef in 2010 was that there were no manual counts done in random towns / provinces/ regions to prove without a doubt that the machines were counting and relaying real votes.  and of course there was all the talk from credible, and very concerned, IT people about 236 glitches, weaknesses, defects, flaws.  236!  here’s ex-comelec commissioner augusto “gus” lagman:

[Lagman] noted that when he was still with Comelec, the poll body opted to sign anew a deal with Smartmatic even if the latter had failed to address a lot of errors in the machines.

He said when he joined Comelec, the PCOS machines had “236 problems.”

“But these problems have not been addressed, and yet Comelec proceeded to enter into the deal,” he added.

He asked: “Are we going to count on Smartmatic’s word that these will be addressed?”

Lagman, an IT expert, believes that the machines can be hacked. The petitioners before the SC believe that this could eventually lead to widespread cheating.

says butch del castillo in Those cursed PCOS machines

During the High Court’s hearing on the petitions early this month, former Commissioner Lagman (who was called by the High Court to express his dissenting views) said Comelec’s approval of the purchase came long after its option to purchase had expired. Lagman said Comelec should not have renewed Smartmatic’s contract “because the technical glitches in the PCOS machines were not addressed.”

“Proof of the problems is that they were trying to repair it, an admission that the problems existed,” he said.

Lagman described the whole network of PCOS machines as “very vulnerable to tampering.”

He said, “it does not have enough security features and has no digital signatures, which were supposed to be given by election inspectors rather than the machine.”

Lagman also pointed out that the Smartmatic system “had no mechanism to check the authenticity of the ballots and votes supposedly shown.”

Lagman’s views on the fatal defects of the PCOS machines were similar to the findings of the Philippine Computer Society and other concerned entities that organized themselves into a watchdog group called Tanggulang Demokrasya or Tan Dem.

okay, so the supreme court summoned the IT expert ex-commissioner lagman pala and listened naman to his objections re the use of smartmatic’s PCOS machines sa 2013.  and yet the supreme court has nothing to say about these objections.  the problem, i suppose, is that the four separate complaints questioned only the legality of the contract signed last march by smartmatic and comelec, and did not raise the lack of security features, the vulnerability to tampering, atbp.  bakit?  they were so sure that there was no way the court would find the contract legal?  that wasn’t very bright of them.

The court said the contract was still valid and existing because the performance security bond posted by Smartmatic-TIM was not yet returned.

The bond was in the form of a letter of credit worth P360 million or 5 percent of the original P7.2-billion poll automation contract for the May 2010 polls.

The bond was meant to fund penalties for non-performance or should Smartmatic-TIM fail to deliver the equipment based on contract schedules.

“That was one expressly stated in the contract, that return of the performance bond will terminate the contract,” (sc spokeslady) Guerra said.

“The court found that the main contract for the automated election system between the Comelec and Smartmatic–containing an option to purchase–was still existing when Smartmatic extended the period and when the Comelec exercised said option,” she said.

and now that it’s a go, biglang Chiz has no more doubts about PCOS.

Escudero said he also used to have doubts about the PCOS machines, but that Comelec statistics on electoral protests after the 2010 polls show the machines work.

“Lahat ng recount nila so far, kung ano ang nabilang ng PCOS at resulta ng halalan, ‘yon pa rin ang eksaktong lumabas. Sa katunayan, ayon sa Comelec, wala pa raw protestang nananalo tungkol sa maling bilang ng PCOS sa lokal na mga laban,” he said.

really?  can we see these comelec reports too?  and when did comelec come up with these statistics on electoral protests — before or after gus lagman was removed?

The Palace decision not to re-appoint Augusto “Gus” Lagman to the Commission on Elections (Comelec) is regrettable, particularly for a government that claims to be championing reform. Last week, a Cabinet official informed Lagman that his appointment as commissioner was rejected outright by the Commission on Appointments. He was not even given the benefit of appearing before that body. The Cabinet official explained that the Palace wanted to spare Lagman from grief and possibly a confrontation with members of the appointments commission – or at least one powerful member, supposedly Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile. Had he been re-appointed, though, Lagman would have welcomed the opportunity to face Enrile or whoever and to explain in a public forum whatever issue might be raised against him. We would have wanted to see that, too. Unfortunately, Lagman will never have that chance.

“supposedly,” enrile himself?  googled it and found this report of march 23, just a week before corona was convicted — peaking nuon ang presiding senator judge.

Brillantes found an ally in Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile, who challenged critics to identify elected officials presently occupying government posts who benefited from alleged glitches in the automated voting.

“Of course, any technician can find something to criticize. But I’m talking about the result of the last election. If you can prove to us that there are people sitting now, exercising power, who were the product of cheating during the last election, then maybe we are open [to changing the system],” Enrile told complainants at the hearing of the committee on electoral reforms.

“If we say there’s cheating with PCOS, are we also saying that the victory of President Aquino involved cheating? I think that’s impossible. Even in the case of (Vice President Jejomar) Binay, there was no cheating,” Enrile said in Filipino, noting that he had presided over the canvassing of votes of president and vice president in the 2010 elections.

ganoon?  alam ba yan ni mar roxas ?  well, enrile’s son is with binay’s una party, no? which makes it even more interesting that one of the solons now daring smartmatic and comelec to bare PCOS’ errors and repairs is jack enrile.

… a day after the high court upheld the validity of the P1.8-billion contract of the Comelec with Smartmatic-TIM for the purchase of 82,000 PCOS for use in the 2013 elections, two lawmakers from the House of Representatives on Thursday expressed their apprehensions over certain alleged security defects that make the machines vulnerable to tampering.

Cagayan Rep. Jack Enrile said the Comelec must categorically address technical concerns aired by one of its former commissioners that the PCOS machines used to automate the May 2010 elections remain vulnerable to tampering.

Enrile said that “even if the high court upholds the Comelec’s decision to use PCOS machines in 2013, election officials are still hard-pressed to shed light on allegations by one of their former colleagues that the machines remain vulnerable to tampering and do not have enough security features.”

He said the poll body must clearly demonstrate to the public that the technical glitches have already been corrected.

He urged the Comelec to make a voluntary demonstration of the new PCOS machines’ features and operation and open the technology to scrutiny by independent IT experts.

Enrile had earlier called on the Comelec to make the PCOS machines available for pre-testing by interested parties even for a limited time, saying this will allow independent groups to identify possible glitches and provide feedback on how to further improve the system.

“The only way to see if the technical glitches in the PCOS machines have been corrected and that security features have been improved is to allow for an actual and thorough examination by independent IT experts on this technology,” he stressed.

“This would assuage public fears that results of the elections could be manipulated if Comelec pushes through with the use of the PCOS machines in the 2013 mid-term elections. The Comelec needs to convince the voting public that results of the elections will be credible and that their voice will be counted come election day,” he said.

“The Supreme Court should also look deeper into Lagman’s allegations and make an independent determination on the veracity of these concerns,” Enrile added.

so father and son don’t agree on PCOS?  o nagda-drama lang sila, nagpapalabas, kumbaga?

Bayan Muna Rep. Neri Colmenares, vice chairman of the House committee on suffrage and electoral reforms, said the Supreme Court should have gone beyond the validity of the Comelec’s deal to examine Smartmatic’s capacity to comply with the contract.

“Why should we entrust our votes to a company that failed to comply with its own security measures and contract in the 2010 elections?” Colmenares said.

“Had the votes in the 2010 presidential elections been close, there would have been serious turmoil in the country due to the lack of transparency.’’

jojo robles may be right.  it would seem that the complainants underestimated the powers of presidential wishes in these post-corona times.

It is no secret that Aquino, who was installed by Smartmatic’s PCOS machines, was wholly in favor of allowing the subcontractor to continue its work in next year’s midterm elections. Aquino’s push for the renewal of Smartmatic’s contract was a radical turnaround from his original position, however, that a new election automation provider must be found through a new bidding.

Comelec, under the leadership of Aquino appointee Sixto Brillantes, has never hidden its desire to continue using Smartmatic as its automation provider despite the protests lodged before it and, later on, before the Supreme Court. Last April, the high court led by Chief Justice Renato Corona, who had already been impeached and was then being tried in the Senate, issued restraining orders on Comelec to stop it from continuing to honor its contract with Smartmatic and from purchasing the PCOS machines.

googled the part about the prez previously saying that a new election automation provider must be found through a new bidding.  found nothing.  but found this, circa jan 2011:

The President said he was also in search of a commissioner who is knowledgeable in the field of information technology because of the automation of the country?s elections.

“We have the opportunity to really transform our electoral process through the selection of these people,” he said.

then why did he let lagman go? read this: Just how low can he get.

i wish none of the above were true.  i wish we could be convinced that the PCOS machines are now working perfectly and cheating would be impossible in 2013.  but it’s just too much of a stretch.  better praning than sorry.

*

read too del castillo’s Horror stories about PCOS machines and elinonapigkit’s Post Analysis of Cheating in the Automated Counting and Transmission of Votes of the May 10, 2010 Election.

choosing a chief justice

read Why the next CJ should be an insider, sent to malaya by a lawyer who requested anonymity, and published in the spirit of, heed the message, don’t shoot the messenger.

read also solita collas-monsod’s The best candidate for chief justice.  after disposing of the four major objections to the appointment of acting chief justice antonio carpio, she turns to what his actual performance has been in the supreme court:

…I have read his opinions, whether majority or dissenting, in a number of cases which I followed closely because of their importance to either the Philippine economy or its polity. And I have come away deeply impressed by the clarity and logic of his thinking, the solidity of his arguments, the homework he so obviously has done. No strain to credulity, no mental gymnastics, no decision-first-justification-later.

Moreover, as Tony La Viña of the Ateneo School of Government puts it, “He is consistently on the right side of environmental social justice and public accountability cases.” Some of these opinions I have written about, and I invite the Readers to refresh their memories—from people’s initiative to Radstock, to Koko Pimentel, to La Bugal and mining, to martial law.

But wait. A chief justice also has to be an excellent administrator. Does Carpio have what it takes? Just ask the Supreme Court staff how he has handled the administrative tasks assigned to him. Accomplished. Soonest.

And the latest proof, of course, is how, in his first meeting en banc as acting chief justice, he led the high court in reversing its stance on the disclosure of statements of assets, liabilities and net worth.

What are we waiting for?

i agree with the lawyer who prefers to remain anonymous, better an insider than an outsider for all 10 reasons he listed.  and mareng winnie has just sold me on  carpio.  thank god she wasn’t selling justice lourdes sereno, just because, hey, she’s the one who wants to raise compensation for hacienda luisita to some 10B bucks instead of just the ordered 200M.  no wonder the prez is keen on a new CJ in the Sereno mold.

right after the corona conviction, my kneejerk reaction to carpio as the next cj was a big no. following the president’s logic, that corona was gma’s man, carpio would only be the president’s man. but then, again, following that logic, anyone aquino appoints would be aquino’s man.  surely there’s something not right about that.

googled it and found this from todd e. pettys, university of iowa college of law:

After identifying the original rationales for our longstanding tradition of permitting the President and Senate to decide which of the Court’s nine members will serve as Chief Justice, I argue that those rationales are anachronistic, that the tradition creates unnecessary conflicts of interest and separation-of-powers concerns, and that the Court’s members should be permitted to decide for themselves which of them will serve as Chief Justice.

way to go.  or we’ll never have a truly independent judiciary.

oh no, another VFA in the making :(

so.  the president has certified the ratification of the RP-Australia Visiting Forces Agreement as urgent, and the senate is called upon to approve and make it a binding agreement.

yesterday i caught senator miriam on the senate website’s livestream interpellating proponent senator loren on the infirmities of the agreement.  read Miriam slams Australia VFA where she points out the vagueness of certain provisions such as the “other activities mutually approved by the Parties,” the lack of specificity on the magnitude of the Australian military presence, the matter of tax exemptions that needs the approval of the majority of both houses of congress, and the rules on criminal jurisdiction that, she says, impinge on the supreme court’s exclusive powers.

nonetheless, today the senate passed the resolution on second reading, just before taking off for another vacation.

Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile -together with Senators Loren Legarda, Jinggoy Estrada, Franklin Drilon, Vicente Sotto III, Pia Cayetano, Bong Revilla, Teofisto “TG” Guingona III, Antonio Trillanes IV, Edgardo Angara, Kiko Pangilinan, Panfilo Lacson and Gregorio Honasan – voted to approve the measure on second reading.

Meanwhile Senators Joker Arroyo, Ralph Recto, Serge Osmeña III, Ferdinand Marcos, Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III and Miriam Defensor-Santiago voted against the passing of the SOVFA or Senate Resolution 788, which was certified by President Benigno Aquino III as urgent and was sponsored by Senator Loren Legarda on Monday. There were 21 senators present during the plenary session.

i suppose it will be first on the senate agenda when they resume sessions in august.  second lang malamang ang RH bill.   hopefully, mainstream and social media will be paying attention then and raising the questions that need to be raised.

for the record: the status of visiting forces agreement (SOFVA) was signed in australia on 31 may 2007 by then defense sec hermogenes ebdane jr and his counterpart defense minister brendan nelson in the presence of president gloria macapagal-arroyo and then australian prime minister john howard.

the curious thing is, president gloria sat on the agreement.  in october of that year, some 4 months after the signing, opposition senators mar roxas and jinggoy estrada were complaining that gma had yet to officially transmit for Senate concurrence the Visiting Forces Agreement signed between the Republic of the Philippines and Government of Australia on May 31, 2007.

“Australia is one of the largest providers of defense training to our soldiers, second only to the United States. It has also been generous in funding human rights projects in the Philippines. Certainly, a defense agreement such as this deserves urgent attention from the Philippine side,” Roxas and Estrada pointed out.

a month later, in november, it was gloria’s new defense sec who asked the senate to ratify the agreement with australia asap.

Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro on Sunday appealed to the Senate to immediately ratify the Philippines’ Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) with Australia.

“Well, as soon as possible. We (defense department) were hoping that they (Senate) review it and approve it as soon as possible because Australia has already done so,” said Teodoro when asked about the urgency of the SOFA ratification.

so why did the senate sit on it, too, in the time of gloria?  america did not approve, maybe?  or maybe because there were serious objections?  read Abu Sayyaf and US and Australian military intervention in the southern Philippines by carolin liss of murdoch university.

The proposed involvement of Australian troops has also already caused concern and protests. Some activists have, for example, questioned the motivation behind Australia’s proposed involvement in the southern Philippines, accusing the Australian government of instigating SOFA to protect Australian commercial interests in the Philippines. The interests of Australian mining companies are of particular relevance here, with numerous Australian companies already active in the Philippines. Furthermore, at the time SOFA was signed, Arroyo had been meeting with representatives of the mining industry, including executives of Melbourne-based BHP Billiton to discuss a multi-billion dollar nickel project in Mindanao.

and here’s blogger friend adebrux, very into foreign affairs, commenting in ellen tordesilla’s post back in 2007 on the very day the agreement was signed in canberra:

the SOFA that will be signed between RP and Australia under the auspices of the office of Gloria bruha should be examined with a fine toothcomb.

SOFA, Status of Forces Agreement was patterned after NATO-SOFA (I know coz the guy that negotiated the SOFA for Pinas talked to me about it at length); I reminded the this friend of mine that SOFA (the NATO one) has provisions in it allowing for foreign troops not only to do military exercises but to get stationed in the host country requiring the setting up of military bases for the visiting troops (therefore foreign) or that goes against RP Constitution.

Friend told me that he reminded then DND chief (Cruz) about it – he even snickered that Cruz was just immitating the SOFA (NATO) for RP without knowing the full substance of what he was copying implying that Cruz may be a legal eagle but was still short on the very fine lines in military treatises.

Of course, the Aussies would be in in high heavens – imagine they would be able to extend their tentacles and set up military facilities in Pinas that is if the SOFA they are signing with Pinas is NATO-SOFA carbon copied.

As I’ve said time and again, in this same blog, the Aussies have more intel assets parked in Pinas than US CIAs put together.

I alerted Sen Pimentel about this when the first draft of SOFA was submitted to Pinas. He said at the time that he didn’t know what the treaty contained yet and so he’d rather wait and see.

For all you know, the SOFA that Gloria is about to sign (her DFA chief actually) might be a trap – you might wake up being surrounded not only by American troops but by Aussie troops too and all in violation of RP Constitution. While these foreign troops might want to be helpful to Pinas, their presence could also spark an Iraq scenario in the Philippines, sort of an accident waiting to happen.

Anyway, Philippines beware! [May 31, 2007 7:18 am]

Oh btw, I have no doubt the the US urged Pinas to go for the SOFA treaty with Australia. Not that Americans couldn’t have twisted the arm of Gloria to sign a SOFA with them but with the VFA already going [up] in flames, they needed an ally to take the heat away and who better than Australia to do it for them – acting as surrogate SOFA signatory for the US?  [May 31, 2007 7:23 am]

Australian defence dealers have been some of the most corrupt of the corrupt – they made several commanders of the Philippine Coast Guard VERY VERY WEALTHY! Once a shipbuilding company tried to sell a project to Pinas and almost sold it to the Navy complete with equipment that were still on the drawing board had I not shown them evidence that the company in question was about to go bankrupt unless they signed the deal with the Navy (the deal would have given them a lease on life and would have been used in Australia to get new investors in their company.) They had a broker who was a former military officer living in Forbes park and who happened to be an excellent bosom buddy of a former Senator who was chairing the defence committee in the Senate. [May 31, 2007 7:32 am]

there is also, of course, the unconstitutionality of allowing foreign military forces in our territory.  palusot lang naman talaga yung konseptong “visiting”.  pero akala ko for america lang, because of our history, kasi “special” nga, di ba.  but for australia as well?  and then, maybe, israel?  germany?  uk?

hopefully the palace is not planning to ram this VFA-A down our throats without informed public discussion.  let not the senate vote on this in the name of their constituencies without first convincing us that it would be good for the country, especially at a time like this, when we have our hands full with america and china, and our notions of sovereignty and security are on the line.

media should start doing their homework and sharing whatever they learn with their public.  whichever way it goes in august, twill be a measure of mainstream and social media’s notions of nation.

Which country is the ‘hoodlum’?

By Isabel Escoda

Was that Beijing blogger who labeled the Philippines “a hoodlum country” serious when he urged his government to “use force” to settle the territorial dispute in the South China Sea? And wasn’t Manila entertainer Jim Paredes being facetious in saying that Filipinos should claim Hong Kong’s Statue Square?

Do the overheated exchanges between the two countries’ bloggers border on the infantile? Are Chinoy media commentators and Pinoy columnists overdoing the threats and pontification? Why did I think of a Marx Brothers scenario when the Philippines yanked out the Chinese flag that had been planted on the Spratly Islands some months ago? Isn’t the wrangling over a bunch of shoals (defined in the dictionary as sandbars) a fatuous tit-for-tat game? Isn’t it reminiscent of that kid’s game where one person slaps a hand over the back of his opponent’s hand while the other slaps his over it, with the hand-over-hand slapping continuing until one party tires?

Did announcer He Jia of state-run CCTV in Beijing, who declared early this month that “We all know that the Philippines is China’s inherent territory,” misspeak on purpose, or was she parroting the claim by Chinese officials that the islands in question are “an indisputable part of China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity”? Did her muted apology evaporate into space?

Did Beijing’s pronouncement that China is “prepared to respond to any escalation if Manila engages in more provocations” confirm suspicions among Pinay helpers in Hong Kong that they’re gradually being eased out because more Indonesian women are now being hired as servants in the territory?

Will Hong Kongers and mainland Chinese fulminate forever over President Aquino’s refusal to apologize for the deaths of eight Hong Kong tourists during the 2010 bus hijacking at Rizal Park? Was that a reverberating raspberry response across the sea to his admission that “things could have been handled better”? Are there really “bacteria problems” in Philippine fruit, as Beijing’s quarantine department claims, which is why they’ve stopped banana imports?

Isn’t this territorial imbroglio somewhat reminiscent of the war Britain waged against Argentina over the Falkland Islands in 1982, when Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher sent her country’s mighty fleet to crush the Latinos? Was Thatcher in the wrong because the Falkland Islands are right next door to Argentina, with Britain half a continent away? Or was that formidable prime minister right in that all of the Falklands’ inhabitants said they preferred to remain British? Wasn’t there a joke then about that war being like a squabble between two bald men fighting over a comb?

Now that Manila commentators are using “West Philippine Sea” instead of South China Sea, can China be stopped from altering its maps? While it’s obvious that the Scarborough Shoal lies just to the left of Luzon and the Spratly Islands are right next door to Palawan (and closer to Vietnam than to China), where is the United Nations’ Law of the Sea now that it’s needed? Does the wrangling just boil down to the possibility of finding oil in the disputed areas?

Is anyone concerned that the Philippine Navy is puny compared to China’s? Aren’t most of our ships and military hardware second-hand stuff, courtesy of the US government? Is the Pinoy dream of being a plucky David to China’s greedy giant realistic?

Wasn’t it another Chinese blogger who said that if every Chinese person spat, the Philippines would drown? Didn’t that remind me of finding, when I first came to Hong Kong in the early 1980s, the locals spitting everywhere? Didn’t the British colony then seem like one big spittoon? Wasn’t it the late writer Anthony Burgess who described hawking and spitting as “the national sound” made by overseas Chinese?

Didn’t my late mother tell us stories about her Chinoy lolo who washed up in Tayabas from impoverished Amoy, cut off his queue, changed his name to Samson and learned to speak Spanish? Didn’t he do well by marrying a savvy Pinay, setting up a business and producing 10 children—one of them my grandmother who spoke and sang beautiful Spanish?

Will the verbal assaults keep ricocheting across the ocean while politicians on both sides ignore more pressing problems on land? Is the issue more about human perversity than nationalist pride? Who knows?

Isabel Escoda is a freelance journalist based in Hong Kong.