by Gerard Naval
Malaya
From the Inquirer: SC sees no need for a TRO on payments
Elections chair Jose Melo yesterday rejected the call of the Concerned Citizens Movement (CCM) to withhold the initial payment to Smartmatic/Total Management Information for the 2010 poll automation contract saying it would be tantamount to the complete stoppage of the entire project.
“It’s almost like imposing a temporary restraining order on ourselves,” he told reporters.
“Why should we not pay them if they were able to deliver? They might not send their next deliverables if we don’t pay the previous deliverables,” Melo told reporters.
The group, led by UP Prof. Harry Roque last Monday asked the Supreme Court to stop the Comelec from releasing payments to Smartmatic/TIM saying the Philippine government stands to lose money if the High Court eventually nullifies the P7.2 billion automation contract.
The contract states the poll body will deposit in a bank the entire payment for the whole exercise.
It said Smartmatic/TIM can only withdraw the payments each time it delivers its goals and deliverables to the Comelec dubbed as “milestones”.
The Comelec’s calendar for the 2010 elections indicates that the first set of milestones – the “project initialization, set up project management team, and project systems including delivery of all software licenses and firmware” – is scheduled the end of the month with a payment amounting to 10 percent of the contract or about P720 million.
Melo said the poll body is putting up a project management office, to be headed by Comelec executive director Jose Tolentino.
Sen. Francis Escudero urged Smartmatic/TIM to proceed with the groundwork instead of insisting on a down payment of 40 percent from the Comelec or about P2.88 billion.
“We are losing more time. Smartmatic/TIM should be paying more attention as to how it intends to carry out its mandate of automating the elections as contained in the contract it signed with Comelec,” he said.
“Problems are now piling up and it does not look good for the consortium to insist on payment first without doing anything,” Escudero, co-chair of the congressional oversight committee on poll automation, said.
“It’s going to be a nightmare rolling out poll automation in one year. Now the real work should begin and this is what Smartmatic/TIM should be paying attention to, not billing,” he said.
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