The Commission on Elections (Comelec) kicked off its provincewide Automated Counting Machine Roadshow in Bacolod City on Monday, Dec. 2, to teach voters how to use the ACM and to assure that it has features that will enable them to verify that their votes were properly read.
The roadshow throughout Negros Occidental to introduce the features of the ACM that will be used during the May 12 midterm elections next year will last until the end of January.
Candidates and their representatives were the first to be invited to experience the use of the ACM at the Ayala Malls Capitol Central on Monday.
Bacolod Elections Officer Revo Sorbito said the new ACM manufactured by MIRU Systems is smaller than the vote counting machine before.
There are two ways for a voter to verify that the machine read his or her vote correctly. First, through the voter verifiable paper audit trail or the receipt that comes out and the actual image of the ballot that can be viewed on the ACM screen within 20 seconds, he said.
ACMs have also been sent to the 31 towns and cities in Negros Occidental for the roadshow, Provincial Elections Supervisor Ian Lee Ananoria said.
“This is Comelec’s way of bringing the voting experience closer to our voters,” Sorbito said.*