Smartmatic reiterates call to Comelec to dismiss DQ petition

Service provider Smartmatic reiterated its call to the Commission on Elections (Comelec) to dismiss the disqualification petition against them in the bidding process for the 2025 automated election.

In a statement released Saturday, Smartmatic maintained that the accusations against them are "unfounded" and that the petitioners "lacked evidence." 

"The petitioners' clear objective is both political, attempting to delegitimize the government, and commercial, supporting Smartmatic competitors. These claims are unfounded, presented as facts but lacking any evidence," Smartmatic said.

The petition against Smartmatic was filed by former Department of Information and Communications Technology chief Eliseo Mijares Rio Jr., Augusto Cadelina Lagman, Franklin Fayloga Ysaac, and Leonardo Olivera Odono on June 15.

They claim that Smartmatic "failed to comply with certain minimum system capabilities that resulted in serious and grave irregularities in the transmission and receipt of election return" during the 2022 polls. 

"The petitioners have not demonstrated a single vote discrepancy. The automated system's accuracy has been consistently proven, validated by Comelec's records, Random Manual Audits, and independent audits and recounts by watchdogs like LENTE and PPCRV," Smartmatic reiterated. 

"Comelec has the resources and facts to affirm the election results as voted by the Filipino people... In upholding the integrity of democratic processes, it is imperative for election management bodies to make decisions based only on verifiable facts and tangible evidence," added the service provider. 

The Comelec en banc has yet to vote on the petition.

Comelec chair George Garcia, however, said that draft resolutions have already been presented to members of the en banc.

'Sabi nga natin, hopefully before the end of this week, ay mailabas namin ang resolution,” Garcia said in a press conference on Wednesday.

(We will issue the resolution hopefully before the end of this week.) 

“We promise to you that whatever our decision is, this will always be for the good of the country, for the good of our election management, and for the purpose of upholding, affirming the integrity of each and every election that the Comelec is conducting,” added Garcia.

Garcia on Wednesday also announced that the submission of the bid documents for a new automated election system in the 2025 midterm polls has been moved from November 28 to December 12.

This was decided by the Special Bids and Awards Committee to give all possible suppliers more time to prepare their documents that will be submitted to the poll body.

Last Friday, the Comelec announced that at least five companies are expected to submit their bids for the P18 billion vote counting machine contract. —VAL, GMA Integrated News