The Commission on Elections (Comelec) received the source code for overseas voting on Monday for the upcoming elections.
Comelec’s international partner, Pro V&V Inc., completed the trusted build for the overseas voting system on Saturday and handed it over to the commission.
Pro V&V president and director Jack Cobb mentioned that another round of testing is scheduled for Wednesday to ensure the system functions correctly.
When asked about issuing certification for the system, Cobb clarified that it is expected to be submitted to the Technical Evaluation Committee (TEC) by the second week of April.
“The report will be [given] to the TEC and to Comelec probably around mid-April; and then from there, it’s gonna go through the TEC’s approval and it’s gonna be Comelec’s approval. The actual certification usually does not occur around 2 weeks before the election,” Cobb said.
“We have the hard work done, we have the source code done, we need to get the software functional audit report done. And all those combined together to make it complete the certification report. There’s also security portion which also needs to be written as well,” Cobb added.
Comelec chairman George Garcia stated that they are currently awaiting approval from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) to deposit the source code for the overseas voting system.
The Comelec has already submitted the source codes for the Automated Counting Machines (ACMs), Election Management System (EMS), and Consolidated Canvassing System (CCS) to the BSP.
Garcia expressed confidence that the commission is complying with the law, which mandates the certification of the election system within 90 days of election day.
“Gusto kong sabihin kasi sinasabi nila required tayo ng batas na three months, eh ibig sabihin po simula noong 2010 to 2022 lumalabag na pala tayo sa batas? Because hindi tayo nakakapag-comply sa three months. Iyung three months na iyan is directory not mandatory,” according to Garcia.