The Commission on Elections (Comelec) reaffirmed on Friday the critical role of conducting a Random Manual Audit (RMA) to verify the precision of the automated vote-counting system.
Comelec Chairman Atty. George Erwin Garcia emphasized that hand-counting a sample of votes remains essential to proving machine accuracy and process integrity, regardless of prior testing or international certifications.
“Napakahalaga [ng RMA] sapagkat ito yung magsasabi kung tama ba lahat ang mga makina sa pagbilang nila, at the same time, tama ba yung sistema, proseso na ipinatutupad natin,” Garcia stated.
“Kasi kahit pa naisagawa namin ang lahat ng mga test at nakakuha tayo ng international certification, yung RMA napakababa naman yung porsenyo na tumutugma ang result ng manually counted at yung machine, balewala rin ang automated election natin,” he added.
Garcia made these remarks during the formal signing of the memorandum of agreement for the RMA, which will be implemented for the inaugural parliamentary elections in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM).
The audit process is designed to detect any discrepancies between physical hand counts and automated machine tallies. The poll body previously recorded a 99.99997% accuracy rate during the May 2025 midterm elections, marking its highest performance to date.
Approximately 2.3 million registered voters are anticipated to cast their ballots on September 14 to select 80 members of the BARMM parliament, including 40 regional representatives.