CHAPTER I

THE PROBLEM AND REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

Introduction

An election is a formal decision-making process by which a population

chooses an individual to hold public office. Elections have been the usual

mechanism by which modern representative democracy operates since the 17th

century. Elections may fill offices in the legislature, sometimes in the executive

and judiciary, and for regional and local government. This process is also used in

many other private and business organizations, from clubs to voluntary

associations and corporations.

Automated election system is a computerization of election process. It's

where people used a specialized computer to vote their candidate instead of the

usual ballot boxes where people cast their votes by way of writing on the ballot.

This process provides much more efficiency and reliability than the conventional

way of voting. This method is faster and can give out result of the election in a

matter of days instead of the secret balloting where it will take weeks or even

months before a result could be presented to the public.

This study aims to discuss the use of Automated Election System of

Arellano University, Legarda Manila instead of using manual ballots because you

get a tally immediately, rather than having to count votes by hand.

 RELATED LITERATURE AND STUDIES

• Local Literature

Although the Poll Modernization Law took effect as early as 1997, it is only

now that computerization of Philippine elections is being seriously considered.

With the passage of RA 9369 in 2007, which amended RA 8436, Comelec has

been mandated to computerize the upcoming May 2010 elections. For this

purpose, the Comelec has contracted with the Dutch company Smartmatic and

its local partner Total Information Management, Inc. (TIM) on July 10, for the

supply of Precinct Count Optical Scan (PCOS) machines. The PCOS are a form

of Optical Mark Reader (OMR) machines that function by reading and counting

the markings made by voters on the ballots after the same are fed to the

machines.

Under an automated election system voters will no longer have to write the

names of candidates. The voting is done by darkening ovals opposite the pre-

printed names of candidates. At the end of voting in every precinct, the results

are electronically transmitted to a central counting center (which could be a

city/municipality or province) for consolidation and proclamation of the winners.

Results are expected to come out in days; it is estimated that the newly-elected

president will be known in two days, while a few hours only for local positions.
This clearly cuts away the multi-layered process in a manual election system and

the concomitant opportunists for fraud.

Now automated election system is use even in our schools. The student

council elections have always been a perennial activity for every school. It is an

activity wherein each student is required to choose from a set of candidates who

will represent each position in the student council. In order for the students to

accomplish this, the students must go through several processes.

Introduction of computers greatly enhances the speed and efficiency of

voting process. Results could be attained even right after the elections reducing

the time to a mere fraction compared to the time it takes if the voting is done

manually. It also increases the level of voting experience because of multimedia

enhancements.

• Foreign Literature

• Foreign Studies

Contrary to popular belief, there are only 16 countries worldwide that have

adopted various technologies for election modernization and of these countries,

only one has utilized a full automated voting, Venezuela (CenPEG 2009; pop.:

27M). These countries pilot-tested the e-voting technologies in mostly

nonpolitical contests first before implementing the technologies in political

elections.

In 2000, Australia (pop.: 22M) used e-voting for 8.3% of the voting

population or 16,559 voters in four polling places. After the 2000 elections, the

Australian Capital Territory Electoral Commission recommended that remote e-

voting be done only if the polling places have secure local area networks. In

2004, e-voting was to be used once more but only in four polling places.

Meanwhile, the Austrian (pop.: 8.2M) government did a test using remote

e-voting in a legally non-binding election in May 2003. In Belgium (pop.: 10.5M),

e-voting has been used since 1991. In 2004, during the regional and European

elections, 3.2 million voters voted using e-voting. “As in the previous election of

May 2003, electronic voting took place exclusively at the polling stations through

a voting machine, which has a screen, a magnetic card reader and an optical

pen”.

In 1996, 30% of Brazil (pop.: 192M) voted using the Direct Recording

Electronic (DRE) Voting System. “By the 2000 and 2002 elections more than 400

thousand electronic voting machines were used nationwide in Brazil and the
results were tallied electronically within minutes after the polls closed. Data was

transferred on secure diskettes or via satellite telephone to central tallying

stations. These in turn transmitted data electronically over secure lines to

tabulating machines in the capital, Brasilia, where the results were consolidated

and announced within hours”.

In 2000, the European Union embarked on a project called CyberVote with

the aim of demonstrating “fully verifiable on-line elections guaranteeing absolute

privacy of the votes and using fixed and mobile Internet terminals”. The

developed e-voting system in the project was tested in different elections in

2002-2003.

Probably one of the biggest e-voting is held in India (pop.: 1.2bn).

Electronic Voting Machines (EMVs) have been in use since 1998 and in 2003 all

state elections and by-elections were held using EMVs. 700,000 polling places

were utilized for the 672 million voters. In these elections over 1 million EMVs

were used.

In Ireland (pop.: 4.1M), however, a critical paper by two computer

scientists about the e-voting system put a halt to the country’s plan of introducing

e-voting in the mid-2004 elections. According to McGaley and Gibson (2003), “in

the rush to appear technologically advanced, inadequate voting systems are

being installed and used. Significant errors and failures in voting systems since

Florida 2002 have been noted…” (2003:2). Part of the criticisms of the scientists

with the chosen technology in the Irish elections is the unavailability of technical

documentation of the system as well as the source code. Regarding the source

code, McGaley and Gibson say that “Since the system does not print out the vote

for the voter’s examination, we have no guarantee that votes are recorded

correctly” (2003:9). They go on to quote Dr. Rebecca Mercuri, a leading

computer scientist studying automated elections systems, “Any programmer can

write code that displays one thing on a screen, records something else, and

prints yet another result. There is no known way to ensure that this is not

happening inside a voting system” (Mercuri 2001 in McGaley and Gibson

2003:9). The authors further assert, “The introduction of electronic voting in

Ireland, in its current form, threatens the integrity of our democracy. As

demonstrated in this report, this is an issue that has been incompetently

addressed by the government” (2003:9).

Norway (pop.: 4.8M) has also stopped using e-voting after evaluation of

the pilot projects in 2003 raised questions about e-voting and the security of the

system. In the United States, there are widespread reports of voting terminal

failures and concerns over the security of machines coming into the 2004

presidential elections. And in March 2009, Germany ruled that e-voting is

unconstitutional because it lacks transparency since the voter cannot see what is

happening inside the machine (Friedman 2009).

Countries which have e-voting use either remote e-voting in which the

voter votes over the internet or phone or polling place e-voting in which the voter

casts his vote in the polling place using automated voting technology such as the

DRE, light pen system, electronic card solution, or the Optical Mark Reader

(OMR).
Statement of the Problem

1. What is the profile of the students in terms of:

1.1 Course

1.2 Year

2. How do the students assess the operation viability of Arellano University

Main Campus Automated Election System (AES) in terms of the following

variables?

2.1. Efficiency;

2.2. Maintenance;

2.3. Performance;

2.4. Reliability;

2.5. Security;

3. How can the propose system be of benefits to the election of the student

council of Arellano University?

Significance of the Study

This study will benefit the following people:

Arellano University Commission on Election/Office of Student Affairs

The results of the study especially the problems and solutions suggested

will help the commission for improvement and future modification of the existing

automated election system. The commission will also be informed of the

feedback by the voting public to the different policies that they establish.

The General public

This study may not only represent the feedback of the electorate to the

student council but will also raise awareness on the advantages and

disadvantages of the automated election system. It may also encourage active

participation by the students and by the Arellano University executives.

Future Researchers

The results of this study can be used as basis for future researchers. The

outcome of the study can be used as reference to similar studies especially with

regards to the automated election system in the Philippines.

Scope and Limitations

The Automated election system (AES) focus only on the election of

Arellano University Main Campus and will only show the results of election and

the percentage of students who vote on each department.

Conceptual and Theoretical Framework

This study is focused on the Automated Electionn System of Arellano

University, Main campus. In this Illustration, the researchers observed the

researchers process.

FEEDBACK

Figure 1.