About AESWatch
The AES Watch (pronounced "eyes watch") is an independent, voluntary, proactive, and nationwide networking of citizens groups and individual volunteers promoting clean elections and ensuring that the May 2010 elections push through–either automated or manual–with proper safeguards and remedies in place towards achieving a peaceful, transparent and credible exercise.
It was formed in mid-October 2009 from a group of more than 200 signatories – individuals and organizations – to the Joint Appeal for the Release of the Source Code initiated by CenPEG (Center for People Empowerment in Governance), University of the Philippines Alumni Association, (UPAA) National Secretariat for Social Action-Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (NASSA-CBPCP), Association of Major Religious Superiors in the Philippines (AMRSP), National Council of Churches in the Philippines (NCCP), Solidarity Philippines, Concerned Citizens’ Movement (CCM), and Ecumenical Bishops Forum (EBF).
Rationale for the Formation of AESWatch
The coming May 2010 national and local elections are crucial. A new President will be chosen, together with other national and local officials, with close to 50 million people expected to vote. For the first time, the synchronized elections will be automated using technology outsourced to a foreign-backed consortium. Time is running out but the Comelec has yet to make a convincing case that it is ready to implement a trustworthy automated election system (AES). Preparations for full automation are replete with uncertainties (e.g., timely delivery by supplier of voting machines, nation-wide availability of electronic transmission facilities, etc.). The Comelec has already revised the AES implementation timetable six times to accommodate delays and constant changes in schedules.
Studies by advocacy groups have found the AES to suffer from technical vulnerabilities such as those related to verifiability of voting results, security of electronic transmission, etc. Safeguards against these vulnerabilities must be put in place to deter internal rigging, but the plans of Comelec in this regard remain unclear. The possibility of electronic fraud, if not satisfactorily addressed, is a serious concern as cheating machineries are getting honed while majority of the Filipino voters have yet to fully comprehend the workings of the AES and their implications on voters’ rights.
Apprehensive about the contingencies faced by the AES, many concerned citizens and advocacy groups have taken separate initiatives to engage the Comelec. Individually, they have shared critical findings of studies on the AES, called and lobbied for safeguards and remedies, and/or offered alternative systems, with the common aim of getting the needed remedial or corrective measures instituted, but to no avail. Some have also asked the Comelec to be forthright in disclosing the true state of its preparedness for the AES. Already, reports from the ground show that most likely elections cannot be fully-automated and that manual voting will still take place in many parts of the country.
Under the circumstances, there is a need to organize a more vigilant and broader coalition of citizens groups and individual volunteers critically looking at the AES preparations, so as to have stronger voice through unified action and public support, in engaging the Comelec. The Comelec must institute the necessary measures, including appropriate contingency plans, to ensure peaceful, clean, and credible elections come May 2010.
Advocacy
The AES Watch will engage the Comelec on issues related to the readiness and trustworthiness of the AES. It will
- Urge Comelec to defining the parameters of its readiness for the automated elections, hybrid or partial automation, and/or manual elections in the country: How many will be fully automated? How many will go partial? How many will go manual?
- Propose appropriate mechanisms and actions for, as well as participate in any way possible, in addressing problems and gaps in the AES preparations;
- Help come up with clear guidelines as well as practical application of an appropriate adjudication process according to the design of the election system;
- Ensure safeguards and remedial measures on the identified vulnerabilities and critical areas to raise the level of trustworthiness and credibility of the AES and/or ensure that elections push through in May 2010 whatever the problems are.
While respecting unified stand on common concerns under the AES Watch, individual members and groups may continue engaging respectively on their own as individual organizations or in tandem with other groups with the Comelec on pertinent issues.
More intensively, the AES Watch will pursue public advocacy with regard to the major issues of poll automation and management with the objective of raising public awareness on the criticalness of the automated election as well as participate in ensuring mechanisms and actions to help ensure clean, transparent, and credible elections. Various forms of advocacy will be used, including:
- statements, letters, paid ads, petitions, press releases, position papers
- participation in JCOC hearings, interventions, dialogues, and consultations with Comelec and concerned stakeholders
- forums, symposia, roundtable discussions, conferences and the like
- media and press dialogues, conference;
- website for education and other exchange of information
- preparation and dissemination of voters education and poll watchers guides in support of all other voters education and poll watch trainings
Fundamental Underlying Principles of Unity
The following principles will serve as the basis of unity and action of the AES Watch:
- Election and the right to vote are a sovereign right. Election is a public, political, and democratic exercise that expresses the people’s free, sovereign, and political will to choose the government that will represent their rights and aspirations as a nation and as a people. It is a means toward making democracy work and making public governance solely as a public service and for public interest with accountability.
- Secret voting and public/transparent counting. Election and all its instruments – including poll automation - must guarantee the democratic principle of secret voting and public/transparent counting. Guided by the right to public information, the people have the right to vote in secrecy as well as the right to know how votes are verified and counted and that results truly express their free and sovereign will.
- Right to know. The right to vote is exercised not only on Election Day. The right to vote includes the right to know how an election system such as the AES works, including its source code, secret and public keys, and all other major features and vulnerabilities. It is the people’s right to know critically whether poll automation will ensure clean, transparent, and credible elections so they will be able to safeguard their votes and make sure their vote counts.
- Clean and credible election. An election can be clean and credible only in the absence of all types of fraud, such as tampered voters’ registration, vote buying, internal rigging and hacking, dagdag-bawas (vote padding- and -shaving), intimidation and militarization, and so on.
- Accountability. Those responsible for negligence and mismanagement of the election, fraud, deliberate voters’ disenfranchisement, partisan politics of government agencies, and all other attempts at manipulating the election must be held liable and accountable in accordance with current election laws.
To promote these principles, AES Watch will actively participate as a network of independent citizens groups in ensuring transparency and credibility in the AES and the May 2010 elections through available legal mechanisms and actions for pre-election, during election and post-election activities of the country’s prime election manager, the Comelec.
Organizational Structure
The AES Watch currently has a Working Group composed of the original conveners who initiated the AES Watch formation last October. This Working Group, as expanded to accommodate new groups and individuals joining the AES Watch, will continue to perform the coordinating function. The AES Watch will have as its highest consensus making body, the Assembly to be composed of all groups and individuals advocating transparent and credible AES and May 2010 polls. The AES membership may be organized into sub-groups to facilitate coordination and action, e.g.:
- IT
- NGO/PO
- Academe
- Church/Faith
- Research/Policy Study
- Business
- Lawyers/Legal
- Media
From the Assembly, a Multi-Sectoral Coordinating Secretariat will be organized from its list of conveners to involve multi-sectoral leaders, representatives of different groups from different regions, volunteering their individual or organizational resources to promote critical AES watch advocacy and active intervention for transparent and credible May 2010 polls.
An Advisory Group may be organized composed of one or two representatives from each of the following sectors: business, IT, church, media, NGO, academe, research/study, lawyers, which can be consulted from time to time regarding the network’s multifaceted concerns.
- The AES Watch full assessment was done on February 28,2010, by the AES Watch Study working team: Alfredo Pascual of the University of the Philippines Alumni Association (UPAA); Evita Jimenez, Bobby Tuazon, Ayi de la Cruz of CenPEG; Dr. Pablo Manalastas of CenPEG and Ateneo Department of Computer Information Systems; Dr. Segundo ‘Doy’ Romero of Association of Schools of Public Administration in the Philippines (ASPAP); Sherwin Ona and Allan Borja of De la Salle University College of Computer Studies; Manuel Alcuaz; and Lito Averia of Philippine Computer Emergency Response Team.
- The working group met on March 17 to conclude the assessment and Ayi de la Cruz prepared a summary of the discussion. Prior to the March 17 meeting, Alfredo Pascual prepared some notes on the AES dated March 3.
- On April 23, 2010 and May 8, 2010, Alfredo Pascual made two separate presentations that updated the STAR Card assessment based on materials coming from Lito Averia and CenPEG.