Palace backs congressional probe on VCM glitches

MANILA, Philippines — Malacañang supports the move of reelectionist Senator Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III to launch a congressional probe on the Commission on Elections (Comelec) over vote counting machines (VCMs) glitches.

“Well, anything that will be for the betterment of this country, we always support. Maybe if many are complaining with Smartmatic, let’s have a probe then by the Senate or the House of Representatives,” Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo said in a Palace briefing.

Smartmatic is the Venezuela-based company that supplied the VCMs for the May 13 midterm elections and three previous automated polling.

Various VCMs malfunctioned on May 13, Election Day, in various parts of the country as millions of Filipinos trooped to polling precincts nationwide.

Panelo said Comelec should review their contract with Smartmatic.

“Oh they should. That should teach them a lesson. There must be something wrong,” he said.

Despite delays in the transmission of results and glitch in Comelec’s transparency server that has caused lag in the release of partial election results, Panelo hailed the poll body for the conduct of the May 13 midterm polls.

READ: Comelec transparency server glitch delays release of partial poll results

“Let me congratulate Comelec because we have seen the winners within hours while in previous years it took them long,” he said. /kga