MANILA, Philippines – The Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting (PPCRV) is more of a “lapdog” than a watchdog, Buhay Rep. Lito Atienza said on Wednesday.
The statement of Atienza came after the release of the random manual audit report showing that the accuracy rate of the vote counting machines is nearly 100 percent.
“Change the watchdog. Hindi watchdog yang PPCRV eh, they are more of a lapdog,” Atienza said at the Kapihan sa Manila Bay forum.
“They say 99.9 accurate, c’ mon PPCRV, you’re supposed to be the watchdog, not a lapdog. Palagi na lang kayong perfect election. Ang dami-daming dayaan; ang dami-daming lokohan,” he added.
According to Atienza, the PPCRV did not perform its duty well during the midterm polls as a watchdog despite the number of irregularities reported across the country.
The PPCRV command center (Photo by LYN RILLON / Philippine Daily Inquirer)
As an election watchdog, the PPCRV was tasked to conduct voter education nationwide, monitor the election, take part in the random manual audit and do parallel counting of the votes.
“I dare the PPCRV, show me one case that you file since the time you became the watchdog and one politician that you put to jail,” he said.
“How elections are already in the ‘kaning-baboy’? And yet you say ‘we had clean elections’? Wala kayong fina-file na kaso, yan yung sinasabi kong hindi kayo watchdog. You have not been watching the elections properly,” Atienza added.
The recently concluded elections were plagued with many issues ranging from the corrupted SD cards, malfunctioned vote counting machines to the 7-hour delay on the transmission server, some groups said.
Still, an audit report showed a high accuracy rate. Election officials who were involved in the audit also said that the elections appeared to be “fraud-free.”
(Editor: Abe Cerojano)
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