ILOILO City – The Commission on Elections (Comelec) is introducing a high-tech voter authentication scheme in a bid to catch “flying” voters and identity thieves on election day, May 13.
This city and Iloilo province have been chosen as pilot areas for the Voter Registration Verification Machine (VRVM).
According to Iloilo provincial election supervisor Atty. Roberto Salazar, the VRVM is a customized tablet computer that the Board of Election Inspectors would be using to verify the voter’s identity instead of manually checking the Comelec voters list.
The biometrics of voters (fingerprints, photos, signatures, and relevant data) are encoded in the VRVM.
The goal is to make sure that only registered voters get to vote, not “flying” voters – those who are registered in multiple precincts – or those assuming the identities of other registered voters, even the dead ones.
The VRVM scans a voter’s fingerprint to determine if a voter is registered and if he belongs to a certain precinct.
If he or she is a registered voter, the gadget will display his or her information on the screen, and only after that will he or she be given a ballot.
But what happens if a registered voter’s name and information do not appear on the VRVM?
The voter may still vote as long as their names are found on the Election Day Computerized Voters List.
On election day, voters will be allowed three tries to have their fingerprint scanned and verified.
Once registration is verified, the VRVM will print out a receipt to be presented to Board of Election Inspectors, who will then provide the voter with a ballot.
Comelec central office would be shipping to Iloilo city and province 2,572 VRVM that would be used in clustered precincts.
Comelec-Iloilo has started training election officers on the use of the VRVM, said Salazar.
Negros Occidental is another pilot site for the voter registration verification scheme.
There are 1,525,168 registered voters in Iloilo province and 1,889,200 in Negros Occidental.
In Iloilo City, 1,134 teachers were tapped as Board of Election Inspectors of the city’s 378 clustered precincts./PN
