Namfrel accredited as Comelec citizen arm in May polls

NAMFREL Press Conference, this morning. The NAMFREL National Council members updated the members of the press who attended the status and content of NAMFREL’s petition for accreditation. The Council also presented and discussed the Open Election Data website one of the flagship projects of NAMFREL for the 2019 Midterm elections. (Photo: National Citizens’ Movement for Free Elections (Namfrel)/Facebook)

MANILA — The National Citizens’ Movement for Free Elections (Namfrel) will also be serving as the citizens’ arm of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) in the May 13 mid-term elections.

“The granting of full accreditation based on the petition filed with the Comelec will enhance Namfrel’s performance to effectively accomplish its self-mandated tasks in the service of free, fair, clean, and honest elections,” said the poll watchdog in a statement Thursday.

At the same time, Namfrel has identified three very important activities to secure the integrity of the process that would contribute to the credibility of the forthcoming elections.

The group said it will monitor the processes and schedules of the Automated Election System, from procurement to delivery of machines to performance of the voting machines and to the transmission and canvassing of poll results during Election Day.

Also, they will design and maintain an Open Election Data website, which aims to increase the transparency of the results, by having the election-related data obtained analyzed and used to detect fraud.

Namfrel added that it will be supporting the Random Manual Audit (RMA) by observing the team that will do manual examination of the ballots to validate the machine count.

The organization is looking to mobilize some 50,000 volunteers to monitor the poll activities in 85,768 clustered precincts on election day.

The Comelec en banc, in its Minute Resolution No.

19-0351 dated March 29, resolved to accredit Namfrel as one of its citizens’ arm for the forthcoming elections.

They will obtain the 27th copy of the Election Returns generated by the Vote Counting Machines (VCM).