This is my article in the 28 December 2011 edition of the Business Mirror.
THE Commission on Elections started the year flushed with success from the first-ever nationwide implementation of the Automated Elections System for the May 2010 national and local elections—the fruition of more than a decade’s work. And yet, it was also sobered by the mixed success of the barangay elections held in October of the same year. Despite renewed confidence in its ability to achieve its loftiest goals, Comelec remained mindful of the existence of lingering issues that still needed fixing.
It was precisely to address those issues that election lawyer Sixto S. Brillantes Jr. hit the ground running when, on the 17th of January 2011, he took office as the 24th chairman of Comelec, joining Commissioners Rene V. Sarmiento, Nicodemo T. Ferrer, Lucenito N. Tagle, Elias R. Yusoph, Armando C. Velasco and Gregorio Y. Larrazabal. Not long after, on the 13th of February, Commissioners Ferrer and Larrazabal retired, leaving two vacancies that were later filled by the appointment of Commissioners Christian Robert Lim—a noted election law practitioner—and Augusto Lagman, an information-technology expert and old hand in elections.
With little fanfare, Comelec lost no time in filing a historical complaint for electoral sabotage against lawyer Lilian Radam—former provincial election supervisor for North Cotabato—in connection with the 2007 senatorial elections. The case against Radam was the first of its kind. Before the year was out, Comelec would file two more.
However, far from focusing only on allegations of past wrongdoing, Comelec demonstrated its determination to attack the perennial ills of elections more holistically than it had done in the past. Numerous initiatives were launched in 2011 that will eventually address the roots of the problems that have long been identified as vulnerabilities of Philippine elections.
In March, for example, the first seeds for the establishment of a campaign finance unit were sown. Since then, an ad hoc CFU committee has been formed under the guidance of Commissioner Lim, with the potential to greatly increase Comelec’s ability to enforce election laws on campaign spending and donations, the better to minimize the detrimental effects of opaque money politics. As a first step, the statements of campaign contributions and expenditures of winning candidates in the 2010 polls have been made available to the public through the Comelec web site.
Continuing voter registration resumed in May, the elections in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao were postponed in June, and Comelec rolled out a five-year strategic plan that featured, among other things, systematic approaches to enhancing Comelec’s capability to manage automated elections. More specifically, Comelec began developing its own canvassing system in a move that will eventually wean us from reliance on commercial systems.
In July Comelec reached out to people with disabilities—identified by the Commission on Human Rights as among the vulnerable sectors that need improved access to electoral processes—by establishing special registration centers. July also saw the release of a series of voter-education materials produced in partnership with a dynamic and popular graphic design studio. These posters initially displayed at all stations of the Light Rail Transit system, have been getting immensely positive reactions leading to greater public awareness about the ongoing voter registration.
In August Comelec became one of the first government entities to adopt the Integrity Pledge as a matter of policy, declaring that the government’s fight to prevent corruption would only succeed by “cultivating a culture of transparency, accountability and integrity.” That same month, Comelec suited actions to words by partnering with the Department of Justice to create an investigating panel that would look into the allegations of anomalies hounding both the 2004 and the 2007 elections.
In November Comelec resumed registration for overseas absentee voters and in less than two months, has already registered more than 9,000 overseas Filipinos. In the meantime, the joint DOJ-Comelec panel completed its work in November, allowing Comelec to file electoral-sabotage charges against former President Arroyo, leading to her arrest and eventual detention. By December, charges of electoral sabotage had also been filed against former Comelec Chairman Benjamin S. Abalos Sr.
Packed almost from start to finish, 2011 can easily be called a good year for Comelec.
However, very few people – even in Comelec itself– are inclined to focus on that in light of the saddening loss of more than a thousand souls who did not live to see any rainbows after the floods in Cagayan de Oro and Iligan. Even after the commission has already sent goods, donated by employees, to the Red Cross, the drive to collect relief goods continues. In a sense, this is probably a better way to end the year: not with self-congratulations, but with the determination to be at the service of others.