May 272013
 
Shoulder the cost.

This was Elections chair Sixto Brillantes Jr.’s comments to defeated senatorial candidate Richard Gordon’s request that seek to prevent the Comelec from removing the precinct count optical scan (PCOS) machines used in the May 13 polls from precincts, schoolhouses or present whereabouts.

“Hindi na namin masosoli yung PCOS, wala na sa presinto yung PCOS. Kung gusto niya isoli niya ulit, pero gastusan niya. Nasa hubs na yung mga PCOS namin, pabalik na dito yung iba,” Brillantes told reporters Monday.

Gordon filed last Wednesday an urgent petition for mandamus asking the Supreme Court to issue a temporary restraining order to prevent the Comelec from removing PCOS machines from precincts, schoolhouses or the machines’ present whereabouts.

This was “to prevent anybody from tampering with the components, contents and software encoded into the said machine,” a press statement from Gordon’s camp said Thursday.  

To which, Brillantes countered: “Basta ready siya to shoulder the cost we will open everything that he likes.” 

Gordon also asked the SC to compel Brillantes to comply with his commitment to give him and other petitioners the complete digital copy of the source code for the automated election system used in this year’s polls.

A source code is the set of instructions to be followed by the computerized voting machine, and is written by computer programmers in a readable symbolic language.

Gordon, who placed 13th based on the official Comelec tally, is also the author of Republic Act 9369 or the Automated Elections Systems Law. Amita Legaspi/RSJ, GMA News