Senatorial candidate Alex Lacson

Lacson is the author of “12 Little Things Every Filipino Can Do to Help Our Country.” The book became a bestseller, and according to him, it created a big impact to himself as a candidate for senator. He gained attribution from those who read it. The book contained things that Filipinos missed of doing/fulfilling. It includes paying taxes, buying local products, following traffic rules and regulations and waste management. Lacson mentioned that it may be simple but it creates dent if everyone is doing it.

He is one of the LP senatorial-candidates that are new in the field of politics, mostly with no names and lacks with popularity. Unlike others who re-runs for the same or higher position. According to Lacson, Noynoy and Mar selected new faces to join the race to initiate changes, giving chance to those who has capability to serve the country and share their ideas and learning to them. According to him, the selection process included balancing the numbers of popular and usual candidates that are running for higher positions and adding new faces that are used with the social activities.

From the platform of the LP, Lacson choose three key areas: education, employment and fighting graft and corruption. He emphasized education and employment–If ever that he assumes a senatorial seat, he would wantto be part of the education and labor committee. Lacson believes the importance of both education and employment and the government should prioritize it.

There were five topics that I’ve raised during the discussion where he can answer yes, no, no comment and can be supported with a sentence or two:

Question 1: Will justice be served in the case of the Ampatuans and Magindanao Massacre this year?

Lacson: No.

Question 2: Do you agree with the reproductive health bill?

Lacson: Not in its present form. There are certain provisions there that violate the basic right of a man on freedom of choice.

Question 3: Do you agree with Church interfering with the State?

Lacson: On the moral issues tama lang yun (it is right), tama lang na pansinin ng simbahan ang mali na ginagawa ng gobyerno (it is right that the church point out the wrong things that the government is doing)

Question 4: After the poll automation and seeing that there were lots of anomaly in the process do you think that the new government should investigate the COMELEC?

Lacson: Tama lang, dapat lang, (Yes, it should be done) as possible kapag nanalo si Noynoy at Mar at nanalo ang senatorial line up (as possible if Noynoy and Mar wins along with the senatorial line up of LP)

Question 5: Do you agree with Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo running for congressional seat in Pampanga?

Lacson: Hindi, bigyan naman natin yung iba, tama na. Masyado nang mahaba ang nine years niya bilang president. Nagawa na niya lahat ng kaya niyang gawin as president. 9 years so bigyan naman natin ng pagkakataon ang mga bata, yung mga bagong henerasyon. (No, she should give chance to others. Nine years as president is enough and she should give chance to the new generation.)

Lacson hails from the Province of Negros Occidental. He graduated law in University of the Philippines in Diliman in 1996. He has also taken post graduate studies in Harvard Law Scool, in the United States in 2002 and Haggai Leadership Institute in Singapore in 2007.

Lacson runs for senator under the Liberal Party, where Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III runs as president and Manuel “Mar” Roxas II as vice president.

Here is a video of the interview:

As part of the celebration of the 2010 UP Manila Political Science Week, the UPM Political Science Society and the UPM Political Science Program Committee hosted a lecture/forum titled ‘Reality Check: A Look at the Potentials, Opportunities and Pitfalls of the Automated Election System.’

Speakers included Prof. Bobby Tuazon of the Center for People Empowerment and Governance (CenPEG) and Einstein Recedes, president of the National Union of Students in the Philippines (NUSP). They raised major concerns over the vulnerabilities of the automated election system and the need for a contingency plan to avert a political disaster.

For CenPEG, the first concern is the fact that COMELEC has already revised the election calendar seven times due to various technical, manpower and machine-related problems. It shows the COMELEC’s incompetence on implementing the automated election system and exposed the poll body’s  over-dependence and over-reliance on Smartmatic-TIM.

The latter, it has been stressed by  citizens’ watchdogs, could be a violation of the COMELEC’s constitutional mandate to secure the elections and opens the electoral exercise to intrusions by  a privately-owned (read: profit-driven) consortium where foreign interests have a stake. This may undermine the credibility of the coming elections.

Secondly, no voter verifiability feature has been installed in the machines or in the software to be used in running the machines, a situation that violates a part of Article 7 of Republic Act 9369 which states that the machines should provide the voter a system of verification to find out whether or not the machine has registered his choice.

Lastly, the COMELEC has not been able to provide a Geographical Information System (GIS) to find out and show areas where transmission of election results may not be possible due to lack of power supply, power supply fluctuations, flood-prone areas and other problems.

Without the GIS, the COMELEC would not be able to create a plan on what part of the country will hold its election manually or automatically and may ultimately undermine the conduct and credibility of the elections. Imagine if the COMELEC just decides on Election Day to implement manual voting in areas previously reported to be hotbeds of cheaters!

The COMELEC seems would just react to what would happen on Election Day itself. This is another glaring proof that the COMELEC is not ready.

CenPEG has helped convene the AES Watch, an independent citizen’s alliance for credible and transparent elections. Its has asked the COMELEC to set up a contingency plan.

If not addressed, the many problems we have already witnessed and continue to witness in the field trials and mock polls may endanger the automated election system itself and may lead to automated vote padding and shaving, massive internal rigging, and questionable election result. Ultimately, elections that lack credibility would lead to political instability or a failure of election.

I think no technology or forms of modernization would answer the problem of cheating in Philippine elections. It remains to be a political and moral issue. Those who want to cheat will always find a way to buy votes, to change the election results and to do anything to make them stay in power. Whoever controls the technology controls the votes!

Confident si COMELEC Spokeperson James Jimenez habang sumasagot sa katanungan na may posibilidad bang magkaroon ng failure of election sa unang poll automation ng bansa sa May 10, 2010.

Ayon sa kanya malabong mangyari ito dahil kung sakaling magkaproblema sa automation ay maaaring gawing manual ang bilangan ng eleksyon na kung saan ang karamihan ay alam na ito at ginagawa.

Kasama sina Prof. Raul Pangalangan (UP College of Law), Christian Monsod (Former COMELEC Chairman) at Gregorio Larrazabal (COMELEC Commissioner) sa unang ABS-CBN News and Current Affairs “E-Leksyon: The 2010 Voters Empowerment Series” na naglalayong mapagusapan ang mga issues at concerns na tungkol sa bagong sistemang gagamitin sa 2010 Election at iyon ay poll automation.

Ginanap ang forum kagabi January 29, 2010 sa Dolphy Theater, ABS-CBN Compound, Quezon City.