Comelec dismisses raps as ‘publicity stunt’

Comelec Chairman Sixto Brillantes. FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines—Commission on Elections (Comelec) chairman Sixto Brillantes Jr. dismissed Friday the filing of a complaint by civil society groups before the United Nations (UN) Committee on Human Rights as a mere “publicity stunt.”

“I feel they just want to make publicity,” Brillantes told reporters.

“It’s a publicity stunt on the part of whoever they are,” he said.

Civil society groups Concerned Citizens Movement (CCM), Center for International Law (Centerlaw), and Automated Election System (AES) Watch earlier held a press conference in the University of the Philippines saying they will file a complaint against Comelec in the UN Human Rights Committee.

“The Filipino Authors allege that their right to free expression of their will as electors have been violated by the Republic during the 10 May 2010 elections and continues to be violated in the conduct of the 13 May 2013 automated elections,” lawyer Harry Roque said in a statement.

“They add that their right to free expression of their will as electors was violated by the Republic when it gave complete control of the technical aspects of the automated elections to a foreign entity, Smartmatic, and by giving control of the public and private keys to all the PCOS machines to the same foreign entity,” he said.

The lack of a source code review in 2010 was also cited as a reason for the complaint.

Brillantes however, had stated in previous interviews that the source code was made available for review back in 2010 but no one had applied for it.

The source code for the 2013 elections, however, could not yet be released pending a legal dispute in the United States between Smartmatic and Dominion Voting Systems Inc, which owns the PCOS technology.

Brillantes hit back at the civil society groups saying “they can’t win in the Supreme Court here, that’s why they are going elsewhere.”