(PNA file photo)
MANILA – The Supreme Court on Monday ordered the Commission on Elections (Comelec) to give its side on the suit filed by Smartmatic, which challenged its disqualification from the bidding process for the automated election system for the 2025 midterm polls.
In its three-page order, the SC ordered the submission of Comelec’s comments within 10 days on the petition against Smartmatic filed by former Department of Information and Communications Technology chief Eliseo Rio Jr., former Comelec commissioner Augusto Lagman, Franklin Ysaac, and Leonardo Odoño.
The petitioners claimed 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.
In a resolution released Nov. 29, the Comelec disqualified the Venezuela-based company, which was the provider of the Philippines' automated election system since 2010.
“Smartmatic Philippines, Inc. is disqualified and disallowed from participating in any public bidding process for elections, in the exercise of its administrative power to decide all matters affecting the election and in pursuit of its constitutional mandate,” the Comelec en banc ruled.
The poll body also recognized the imminent threat to the integrity of the country’s electoral process posed by the investigation of the United States government on allegations of irregularities hurled against the company and former Comelec chairperson Andres Bautista, which include bribery payments.
The Comelec Special Bids and Awards Committee will decide on Smartmatic’s possible permanent disqualification and blacklisting from all government procurement proceedings, not just election-related.
Meanwhile, the poll body said it is ready to comply with the order of the SC on the petition by Smartmatic questioning the former’s decision disqualifying the company from participating in an election-related bidding process.
Comelec spokesperson John Rex Laudiangco said they have yet to receive a copy of the decision.
But, he assured they would comply with the order.
“Although we have yet to receive our official copy of the Order (per information of the Office of the Clerk of the Commission), the Commission on Elections shall remain consistent to its commitment to comply with the directives of Supreme Court, and at this instance, with the assistance of the Office of the Solicitor General,” the poll body said in a separate message. (With a report from Ferdinand Patinio/PNA)
