Brillantes: Discrepancies in count unavoidable

Comelec chair Sixto Brillantes Jr. RYAN LEAGOGO/INQUIRER.net

MANILA, Philippines – There will always be “discrepancies” between the Random Manual Audit (RMA) and the automated count because of the difference in how a machine and a human looks at the ballots, Commission on Elections (Comelec) chairman Sixto Brillantes Jr. said Wednesday.

“The machine count and the manual count cannot be [a] perfect [match because] the machine is programmed but a human’s eyes cannot be programmed,” Brillantes told reporters in response to a news report on discrepancies found with the RMA.

“[Each person] has their own discretion and each has a different assessment [of the shading on the ballot],” he said.

Brillantes had said that they have lowered the shading threshold of the Precinct Count Optical Scan (PCOS) machines to 20 percent from the 2010 threshold of 50 percent.

If a voter managed to shade the oval in the ballot by more than 20 percent it will be counted. If lower than 20 percent, the machine will not count the vote.

Comelec randomly chose one precinct for every congressional district in the country to conduct the RMA. The ballots will be opened and the votes counted manually. Then it will be compared to the automated results.

Critics, Brillantes said, have kept complaining about discrepancies, brushing aside the fact that the RMA cannot perfectly tally with the automated results.

“[They’re saying] RMA should be 99.999 [percent accurate], but it was only 97 [percent] back in 2010. Can you imagine 97 percent? Isn’t that a very good result, and yet they are downplaying it saying the law says it should be 99.999,” Brillantes said.

“But they are fully aware that the machine count and human visual count will not completely tally,” he said.

Brillantes further clarified that the better term should be “variances” instead of “discrepancies.”

“Perhaps I made a mistake with the use of the word discrepancy. [PPCRV chairperson] Henrietta de Villa [thinks that] the correct term should have been, ‘there were variances’,” Brillantes said.

“‘Variances’ would actually be a toning down of “discrepancies” which is too heavy… eh mas matapang lang ako kung magsalita eh, ginagamit ko “discrepancy” yun na ang na-quote,” he said.

He said that he has ordered for the official RMA report to be released by June 13, at least one month after the May 13 elections.