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Janette Toral posted a call for a discussion of issues relevant to the 2010 Philippine presidential elections, tagging a lot of bloggers in the process.

Instead of one post, I will make a series of post about this topic, and it will be an issue or two per post, hopefully. For every post, I will state an issue, explain why it should be an issue, and share my thoughts on the issue.

If you ask me why we should bother ourselves with the issue of electoral reforms, my answer will be short and sweet: 2005.

The Hello, Garci controversy had shook this nation from its forced stupor. Faced with the prospect of an Estrada comeback via proxy, most of us decided to choose the lesser evil, a choice that no one should have made since there are other choices during that election year (2004). After Gloria Arroyo “won”, everyone but the opposition had decided to stop thinking about politics and instead “channel their efforts into more constructive means of change,” effectively surrendering to the rotten political system we have. But when those wiretap tapes surfaced, many had realized that choosing the lesser evil was a stupid choice after all.

The controversy had shown that the electoral system we have now is easy to maneuver and manipulate. Before 2007, many groups called for electoral reforms, first through automation, and second by appointing competent people to the Commission on Elections. Both came to naught.

Why should this be an issue? At this point, we can all agree that our electoral system is broken, and it needs fixing. And we don’t act now, 2010 will be just a repeat of 2004 and 2007, with almost the same cast of characters. The operators are still around, and those who have retired are probably replaced with people trained for “special operations.” If we want to have leaders as truly elected by the people, we must not allow operators to impose their will on us.

How do we go about it? Two fronts attacking a single problem - fixing a broken system. First front - eliminating the chance for cheats to beat the system. Many people mistakenly think that automation is the end-all and be-all of electoral reforms. Not only this is short-sighted thinking, it is stupid. Like any system, an automated system is composed of several parts, and the weakest link in that system? People. And that is the second front - eliminating the cheats.

That is why appointing the right people for impending vacancies in the Comelec is crucial. These people must be highly competent, upright, honest, brave, and without integrity problems. The nominees should be selected carefully, and the people must be allowed to scrutinize the nominees’ records and voice their opposition. The nomination or selection process should be transparent.

Anyway, I will not tackle the first part, since it is technical in nature. Let’s leave that to the geeks. I think The Jester-in-Exile has a series of blog posts about election automation. The only thing I can share is KISS - keep it simple, stupid!

Still, it all boils down to a trustworthy bureaucracy - people, in a word. If we allow operators to remain within the system, any reform is useless. If we allow people of questionable reputation to sit in Comelec, reforms are impossible.

How do you think should we go with electoral reforms? Share your thoughts at the comments.

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Don’t forget to vote in my poll, in case you haven’t voted yet.

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