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E-mailBeating the February 28 deadline set by the Commission on Elections (Comelec), the consortium Smartmatic said on Sunday that it has completed the delivery of all 82,000 poll machines to be used in this year's automated elections.
According to Smartmatic, the last batch of 13,500 precinct count optical scanner (PCOS) machines arrived in the country on Saturday, completing the required number of machines needed for the conduct of the May 10 polls. The PCOS machines were shipped from Suzhou, China, where they were manufactured.
“We are proud to announce that all the PCOS machines are already in the Philippines, and the implementation calendar is being kept as planned,” said Smartmatic Asia president Cesar Flores.
“We reiterate our commitment to the Filipino people: the automation system will provide fast and accurate elections,” he added.
The units will be stored in a warehouse in Cabuyao, Laguna, where they will undergo a series of tests to ensure that they will all be working properly come election day.
Only about 76,000 of the 82,000 total PCOS machines will be used in the actual elections. One unit will be placed per voting precinct. The rest will be used as spares should any technical glitches arise.
Comelec awarded the P7.2-billion automation contract to Smartmatic and its local partner Total Information Management (TIM) Corp. to produce 82,000 PCOS units, as well as a P243-million contract to manufacture ballot boxes to be used for the country's first electronic voting.
Because of initial delays in the delivery of poll machines, the Comelec had earlier warned Smartmatic that the consortium could get penalized an average of P7.2 million for each day of delay from the February 28 deadline.
In the original poll automation schedule, the delivery of all PCOS machines should have been completed by December 2009. However, the first batch of machines only arrived on the last week of December, with only about 7,000 units.
Smartmatic blamed the delays on the petition filed by the civic group Concerned Citizen's Movement against poll automation. The Supreme Court only ruled in favor of Smartmatic last September. Smartmatic also blamed the heavy shipment traffic during the holiday season for the late deliveries.
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