MANILA, Philippines?All is not lost for proponents of the parallel manual count.

Spokesperson James Jimenez of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) Sunday said the poll body had not completely ruled out the proposal by multisectoral groups for a simultaneous manual tally at least in the races for president, vice president and mayors.

Jimenez said that while Commissioner Gregorio Larrazabal on Saturday expressed misgivings about such a hybrid balloting at ?crunch time,? the rest of the commissioners had not ruled on the issue.

?Commissioner Larrazabal has said that he thinks there are many serious questions about the doability and the practicality of a manual count. But that is not yet the decision of the en banc,? Jimenez said.

He said the issue could be tackled at the en banc hearing Monday.

But Malacañang Sunday supported Larrazabal?s position that it was now too late to resort to a manual tally.

?We believe the law said we should go for automated counting. So if there would be different results in the automated and manual count, we are obligated to follow the automated count and not manual and that may result in chaos,? deputy presidential spokesperson Gary Olivar said on state radio dzRB.

The Comelec also has decided to conduct a random manual audit at the close of the polling on May 10. This means that the Comelec would select five precincts in each of the 229 legislative districts and conduct a manual count to see if results tally with the electronic count.

The randomly selected precincts total 1,145 of some 76,000 nationwide.

In a news conference Sunday, business and other concerned organizations pressed demands for a parallel manual count for president, vice president and mayoral races.

The Makati Business Club (MBC), Management Association of the Philippines (MAP), and the Finance Executives of the Philippines (Finex) reiterated support of a call by information technology professionals earlier this month for a parallel manual count.

If, in a precinct, a discrepancy of at least 1 percent between the results of the manual and automated counting of votes happen, then manual counting of votes for all positions should be done within that precinct, they said.

Open letter to Melo

In an open letter to the public released to reporters, the groups appealed to Comelec Chair Jose Melo and the commissioners ?to be open-minded.?

?The credibility of automated elections has suffered because the Comelec removed many of the safeguards that were initially set in place?source code review, ultra-violet mark checking, authenticity check through digital signatures,? the letter said.

?Credibility and acceptance of the outcome of the elections can be restored by simply adding this one step?the parallel manual count, as proposed by the Information Technology community.?

MBC Chair Ramon del Rosario said the business groups did not wish to taint the automated elections, but they wanted to help prove its ability to deliver credible elections by having the manual counting of votes for the three major positions.

Augusto Lagman of the MAP enumerated what he described as potential flaws of automated elections, citing the possibility that a ?cheating? program could be installed in the precinct count optical scan (PCOS) machine to be used in the country?s first nationwide automated elections.

Proposal consistent with law

Simeon Marcelo, president of the Philippine Bar Association, said the Comelec was mistaken to say that having manual counting of votes violated the Automated Elections System law. He said having a mechanism to check the accuracy of the counting of votes was consistent with the law.

?Having credible elections is a chance to improve the plight of the country?s farmers,? said Ernesto Ordoñez of Alyansa Agrikultura.

Ordoñez said six of the nine presidential candidates supported the parallel manual count. Those against were Senators Manuel Villar and Richard Gordon and former Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro Jr.

?It will be an additional expense on the part of the government. It?s good if the business sector will spend for it but that would be impossible,? said Gordon, who was campaigning in Davao City.

?The counting must be fast. Immediately?on the night of the election day?the country must know who is the new president. If they will drag the results on, then indeed cheating is being done,? he said.

?It is a good idea especially as we doubt if our votes will be protected or not by the new system. But I think the suggestion is too late now. They should have come up with a solid proposal and all of us should have agreed to push for it,? Villar said.

Signature campaign

Bacolod Bishop Vicente Navarra and former Negros Occidental Gov. Daniel Lacson Jr. Sunday voiced disappointment at Larrazabal?s position.

?I hope the Comelec reconsiders its position,? Navarra said. ?Let us exhort our people to call on the Comelec to ensure fair, transparent and credible elections.?

Lacson has initiated a campaign to gather signatures supporting the proposal for a parallel count, which Navarra is backing.

?The signature campaign ? must go on. We need to warn everyone of the risk of a failed election,? Lacson said.

?The coming election is historic on so many levels that it becomes obligatory on the part of Comelec to make sure that there is no room for failure,? Liberal Party senatorial candidate Ralph Recto said in a statement.

?Nothing should be impossible if the task at hand is to safeguard the integrity of the results of the May 10 elections. A parallel manual count should not be a back-up plan, but an annex to Plan A,? Recto said. Michelle V. Remo, Christine O. Avendaño and Michael Lim Ubac; Jeffrey M. Tupas, Inquirer Mindanao, and Carla P. Gomez, Inquirer Visayas