If they have any patriotism left in their hearts, we beg the candidates to save it for 2010.

Save in the sense that any bad intentions to cheat should be left buried underground.

Flawed elections, we kid thee not, is no better than a No Election.

Without credibility, a Third World nation like RP would be avoided like a plague by creditors or investors, the very elements that would be the adjuncts of economic growth. The world could leave the country to swim on its own.

Washington, in unofficial communiqués, has made their desires known for RP to have a democratic exercise of suffrage in 2010. Making those "official" would have been condemned as meddling internal affairs of a sovereign country. But the Palace gets the drift.

Therefore the COMELEC is the institution of the hour. Will it pass the test?

COMELEC is trying hard to redeem its tattered image due to the Garci (2004) and Zubiri-Pimentel (2007) tussles with Chair Melo going into automated elections in 2010 - "my legacy to the Filipino people" - as GMA noted in writing her 10-point Medium-Term goals back in 2004.

Will GMA's gift of automation of elections - after 100 years of the dubious and Jurassic "manual system" - be a worthy legacy?

While hope springs eternal in the heart, there are serious automation land mines that can explode on the faces of the Palace and COMELEC habitués.

Dr. Rene Azurin, MBA professor and management consultant, cited in his research that automation may fail in its avowed mission.

Can the COMELEC, for instance, spot a Trojan Horse inserted in the software "since it cannot be detected by testing", as Barbara Simons, computer technologist and member of the Advisory Board of the Federal Election Center declared?

Who can spot a predatory programmer of the Smartmatic (winning bidder) software supplier from selling his devious technology to dirty election operators?

As Professor David Grill (Computer scientist) of Stanford University confirmed: hackers can use the inherent "buffer overflows" to gain access and mess the system. Does the COMELEC have the antidote against that?

Now what about the innocent "bug" preventing the computer from counting or recording the numbers - then hell will break loose. What happens next?

The case filed by UP Professor Atty. Harry Roque in the Supreme Court included the complaint that Smartmatic has allegedly admitted the possibility of 2-10% of scanning failure of their system. It was proven, according to Azurin, in Sharif Kabunsalan "live" case - where even after corrective measures done - the system still posted a 2% failure rate.

In a tight presidential race for 50 million voters (which 2010 will be), 2% of that translates to one million votes, enough to carry the unworthy to the Palace.
Conrado de Quiros of the Philippine Daily Inquirer said:" Errant commands can be imbedded variously in the BIOS, the motherboard, the operating system, the flash card, or all of the above.

Commands that will tick off votes for one candidate to another, which will make Garci look like a veritable saint."

It is, of course, sad that failures like these would be finger-pointed - surely - at the Palace, who faces an unfortunate situation of not being trusted; accused of dying to stay in power.

Doubtless, the COMELEC will therefore be on the "line of fire" from hereon till the country proclaims a new and credibly-elected president next year.

The situation is not helped any that the looming vice presidential candidate of the administration is DILG chief Ronnie Puno, considered by all,barring none as the" Election Operator of all Operators" - in all its good and bad connotations.

Call it left-handed compliment but Puno was reportedly the shadow behind the amazing win of FVR in 1992 through the Sulo Hotel and camp operations that had a fuming loser Miriam Santiago, in her frustration, challenging FVR to a boxing fight. Her hatred for Puno would also be to her grave.

Puno was a major player allegedly in the dubious elections of 1986 and 2004 - lending his unparalleled talent at "winning" elections in the hands of Marcos and GMA.

He acknowledged being a minor player, but a player just the same, in Erap's 1998 election. Erap with his 40% landslide victory probably did not see much of a need for an "operator".

That is the reason why pragmatists are harping on a possibly VP candidate of politically acceptable Batangas governor Vilma Santos - rather than the Master Poll Magician himself. Nonetheless, that neither suggests that Puno, a huge tree, would just vanish from view in 2010 - and woe to the Opposition.

That is why the Opposition must do its homework and make damn sure that their Main Bet in 2010 will win an electoral mandate that would be considered a landslide.

Given the above, a slim margin of a million or so voters, can be subjected to an "automated cheating" mechanism - bringing an unworthy to the Palace.

But regardless, we stand by our thesis - that cheating electorally in 2010 - is a political and economic suicide. Political, because the cheated voters will rise in anger; economic because lack of credibility will erase all the so-called economic fundamentals.

So to the potential poll cheaters in 2010, stop your diabolical game plan.

They may win - but they will still lose.

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