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The Comelec, led by Chairman Jose A.R. Melo, earlier submitted to Malacañang and Congress a supplemental budget proposal of R21 billion but some members of the Senate, particularly Sen. Miriam Defensor Santiago, said it must be scaled down to a more realistic level, stressing that being poor, it is too much for the country to be spending that much for an election.The Commission on Elections (Comelec) is scaling down from P21 billion to only P13.9 billion its budget proposal for the full automation of the May 10, 2010 presidential, congressional, local, and party-list elections.
The Comelec, led by Chairman Jose A.R. Melo, earlier submitted to Malacañang and Congress a supplemental budget proposal of R21 billion but some members of the Senate, particularly Sen. Miriam Defensor Santiago, said it must be scaled down to a more realistic level, stressing that being poor, it is too much for the country to be spending that much for an election.
Melo, along with Commissioners Rene V. Sarmiento, Nicodemo T. Ferrer, Leonardo L. Leonida, Lucenito N. Tagle, and Armando Velasco, restudied Comelec’s earlier budget proposal and came out with a more realistic figure of P13.9 billion for the full automation of 2010 elections.
They assured that scaling down the proposed budget from P21 billion to P13.9 billion will not affect the quality of poll automation since Comelec will be using technologies that were tested and proven in the Aug. 11, 2008 elections in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM).
Successfully used in the ARMM elections were the Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) technology and the Optical Mark Readers (OMP) system. DRE was used in Maguindanao while OMR was deployed in Basilan, Lanao del Sur, Shariff Kabunsuan, Sulu, and Tawi-Tawi.