Comelec: No advantage for Smartmatic

JIMENEZ

The Commission on Elections (Comelec) on Friday assured its critics and the public that technology provider Smartmatic will not have any advantage over other prospective bidders either for the refurbishing of the precinct count optical scan (PCOS) machines or in the acquisition of new voting machines to be used in the 2016 polls.

“I don’t see any advantage for any particular bidder,” Comelec spokesperson James Jimenez told reporters, stressing that all potential bidders will be on equal footing.

But Jimenez said Smartmatic may still participate in case a public bidding is conducted for the refurbishment of the 80,000 PCOS units despite the Supreme Court decision to junk the negotiated contract between the Comelec and Smartmatic-TIM for the PCOS refurbishment.

On the other hand, he said it was also not a guarantee that Smartmatic would have an advantage should a public bidding for the new 63,000 OMR machines would be conducted instead.

Smartmatic is already undergoing post-qualification evaluation from the Comelec Bids and Awards Committee for the provision of the 23,000 OMR units originally intended to supplement the old PCOS machines. TVJ