From: "Telibert"
To: namfrel@edsamail.com.ph
Subject: Columns on Commissioner Tancangco
Date: Fri, 9 Feb 2001 14:53:23 +0800
"Comelec, Namfrel and the May polls"
(From the column At Large by Rina Jimenez-David, Philippine Daily Inquirer,
Feb. 9, 2001, page A9)
THINGS aren't looking too good for the coming elections in May. First is
the delay in the approval of the national budget, including the Comelec's
budget. While the other government departments could function on last
year's budget, the Comelec faces a disaster because last year's budget did
not include provisions for the elections. How can the country hold elections
without ballots, booths and the money to pay for the services of public
school teachers and other poll personnel?
As if that weren't bad enough, the Comelec is at the moment rudderless with
the retirement of former Chair Harriet Demetriou and two commissioners.
President Macapagal has so far not yet named replacements for the three,
allegedly because she's waiting for Congress to go on recess before naming
her appointees.
In the meantime, the Comelec is caught in a word war with officers of
Namfrel, the citizens' electoral watchdog. The Namfrel once again applied
for accreditation with the Comelec last October but it was only on the
third week of January when the Comelec, in a 5-2 en banc decision, chose to
accredit Namfrel as its "citizens' arm," but not to conduct an "Operation
Quick Count."
The majority decision was supposed to be written by Commissioner Luz
Tancangco, a long-time critic of Namfrel, but that decision has yet to be
released, preventing Namfrel from preparing its formal response to the
Comelec. The latest news is that the Comelec en banc has decided that
Tancangco will no longer be required to write the majority decision, but a
simple "position paper" instead. Namfrel will then be asked to respond to
the paper in time for a hearing on Feb. 14, Valentine's Day.
***
WHY is Tancangco so dead-set against Namfrel's Operation Quick Count? She
bases her objections on a study she conducted of Namfrel's count during the
1987 elections, released in 1991, where she alleged discrepancies or
adjustments at various levels, a "highly improbable" fill-up rate for the
ballots, and a partial count that had higher totals than the Comelec's
final count.
I've listened to Tancangco argue her side on radio and TV, but what she
always neglects to mention is that shortly after her study, based on the
skimpy sample of 14 precincts (out of 100,000), was released, a panel of
colleagues in the UP slammed both its methodology and conclusions.
Jose Encarnacion, then the dean of the UP School of Economics, said "Much
of the discussion in this paper strikes me as just funny (because the
reasoning is so queer), and since it is not meant to be a humorous piece
but a serious academic study, I have to conclude that this paper is simply
an incompetent treatment of the subject."
Dr. Cynthia Bautista, now the director of the Center for Integrative
Development Studies, wrote that "What is bothersome about the report is the
extent with which it estimates the fraud to be at least two million…The two
million votes arrived at by computing the total discrepancy in the 14
precincts and multiplying this by the 100,000 precincts all over the
country is based on basic assumptions about how people voted in the past."
Mahar Mangahas, president of Social Weather Stations, observed that "For
the number of persons who voted to be greater than the number of votes cast
for House (of) Representatives is not a numerical anomaly in the first
place, but (Tancangco) refuses to accept this point…" He likewise cited
Tancangco's "tendency to leap to sensationalistic statements across chasms
of inconclusive evidence."
***
AFTER BEING brought up short by respected figures in the same university
where she taught, one would think Tancangco would at least have felt
humbled and chastised. But no, all she had to say afterwards was: "My
methodology may have been faulty, but I stand by my conclusions."
While many in UP were calling for her sacking because of her blatant
violations of academic standards and ethics, her home college chose to send
her abroad instead for "further studies." A protégé of then UP College of
Public Administration Dean Raul de Guzman, who is of course the brother-in-
law of ex-President Erap and chair of the Erap Muslim Youth Foundation, she
was coddled and protected upon her return and until her appointment to the
Comelec.
Once in the poll body, Tancangco commenced to wreak havoc, starting with
the scandalous decision on the party-list elections (a decision
subsequently slapped down by the Supreme Court) and following that by
refusing to act on the computerization program, which by law was supposed
to be implemented in full this year, and now her word war with Namfrel.
So is Tancangco's vehement stance against Namfrel truly the fruit of
judicious and considered study, or the mere vendetta of a woman scorned for
being shown up to be the flawed scholar and thinker that she is?
"One-woman demolition job at the Comelec"
(From the column Jaywalker by Art A. Borjal, Philippine Star, Feb. 9, 2001,
page 10)
There is great need to beef up the Commission on Elections with new faces,
as replacements for retired chairperson Harriet Demetriou and two other
Comelec colleagues. President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo should thus lose no
time in making her appointments to that election body. The May elections
are fast approaching, and preparations for this all-important event cannot
be left in the hands of the four incumbent Comelec commissioners,
particularly Luz Tancangco whose tenure at the Comelec has been
characterized by mediocrity and dark shadows of wrongdoing.
Tancangco's tenure at the poll body has been reprehensible. She virtually
held the Comelec hostage to her whims and caprices, and to her own hidden
agenda.
As a result, the Comelec bungled its job of informing first-time voters of
the registration deadline, thus denying more than four million youngsters
the right to vote in the coming May 2001 elections. Tancangco also
masterminded the scheme to do away with the computerized vote count,
through her shady handling of the bidding process.
* * *
Eminent academician and highly-respected personage Mahar Mangahas, in his
Manila Standard column yesterday, whaled away at Tancangco for her effort
"to persecute, vindictively and unrelentingly, the National Movement for
Free Elections." Mangahas had, two years ago, formally opposed Tancangco's
appointment as Comelec commissioner.
But Tancangco's appointment passed the congressional confirmation body,
because of the clout and influence of Raul de Guzman, the brother-in-law of
ousted President Erap.
* * *
In his sworn opposition to Tancangco's appointment, Mangahas cited a
University of the Philippines assessment of what was then called the
Tancangco Report about the 1987 election. No logical basis, funny and queer
reasoning, incompetent, irresponsible – these were just some of the
adjectives used by UP's social scientists and demography experts in
describing Tancangco's work.
* * *
"Thus, given her (Tancangco) demonstrated incompetence in prior election-
research, and her unfounded prejudice toward Namfrel, I think it is most
unwise for the Commission on Appointments to confirm the appointment of
Prof. Luz Tancangco as Comelec commissioner," said Mangahas in his sworn
statement sent to the appointment body. "It does not require any special
expertise to assess the Tancangco research as worthless. Her writing is
gobbledy-gook. Just try reading her for yourself, and weep," Mangahas said.
* * *
With all the mess that the Comelec is facing now, you can see how Tancangco
has done almost irreparable damage to the forthcoming electoral exercise.
The longer Tancangco stays at the poll body, without any new commissioners
to counter her devious and dubious schemes, the coming May elections might
turn into a sham, a horrible nightmare that can undo the good things
brought about by People Power II.
* * *
Namfrel Chairman Jose Concepcion has threatened to file an impeachment case
against Tancangco. While it is late for such a case to prosper, throwing
the raps at Tancangco could send home the strong message that the people
will no longer tolerate the shenanigans going on at the Comelec, through
the incompetence and irresponsibility of Tancangco. Probably, it is high
time to show People Power at the Comelec, especially at the doorsteps of
Tancangco.
"The Tancangco Persecution of Namfrel"
(From the column Social Climate by Dr. Mahar Mangahas, Manila Standard,
Feb. 8, 2001)
As I predicted two years ago, in my formal opposition to the confirmation
of her appointment as Comelec Commissioner, Luz Tancangco has continued to
persecute, vindictively and unrelentingly, the National Movement for Free
Elections (Namfrel).
This time she is blocking Namfrel from undertaking its justifiably famous
Operation Quick Count in the coming May election.
My sworn statement addressed to Sen. Aquilino Pimentel, chairman of the
Commission on Appointments, dated March 17, 1999, said:
"Prof. Tancangco, of the UP College of Public Administration, became a
public sensation after having announced to media, on March 10, 1991, that
her study of the 1987 election had reached the conclusion that Namfrel was
responsible for 'wholesale fraud' in that election. Namfrel immediately
protested Prof. Tancangco's charge, which the mass media was playing up as
the challenge of 'the UP study' to the credibility of Namfrel.
"Due to the gravity of the situation, the University of the Philippines took
the unprecedented step of conducting a University Symposium, on April 3,
1991, to assess the Tancangco Report. Of the Symposium's four discussants
invited by UP to assess the Report, three - namely demographics Professor
Mercedes B. Concepcion, economics Dean José Encarnación, and myself - all
declared that the Tancangco Report did not have logical basis for its
conclusion. The late Dean Encarnación put it in a nutshell: "Much of the
discussion in this paper strikes me as just funny (because the reasoning is
so queer), and since it is not meant as a humorous piece but a serious
academic study, I have to conclude that this paper is simply an incompetent
treatment of the subject."
The attempt of the fourth discussant, public administration dean Romeo
Ocampo, to soften the criticism was obviously made out of mere loyalty to
his faculty member. The remarks of other academic critics at the time are
also attached herewith.
"The basic error of logic in Prof. Tancangco's study was to classify as
'fraudulent' any excess of the number of persons who voted over the number
of votes cast for House representative, i.e., she alleged that any blank
space in the vote for congressman was evidence of fraud. Another highly
serious error was to assume that, in every location, the maximum proportion
of voting-age people who register to vote cannot be larger than 85%, i.e.,
she alleged that any excess of the Comelec count of registered voters above
85% of her projected voting-age population, location by location, was
evidence of fraud.
"Prof. Tancangco's motive, stated in the first draft of her report, but
purged from the later draft which she submitted to the UP Symposium, was:
"The nomination of a Namfrel official to the chairmanship of the poll sends
a bad signal to the cause of fair and honest elections in 1992." This was a
clear reference to the candidacy of Mr. Christian Monsod, who had been with
Namfrel, for chairmanship of the Comelec, which was then being considered by
Pres. Aquino.
"Fortunately, the Monsod appointment pushed through anyway, and under his
management of Comelec the 1992 elections were conducted fairly, proving the
fears of Prof. Tancangco to be baseless. After the 1992, 1995, and 1998
elections, no social scientist, to my knowledge, has echoed the 1991
Tancangco report's incompetent charge that Namfrel is a source of election
fraud.
"Although there is no longer any doubt that the 1991 Tancangco study was
totally mistaken in accusing Namfrel of wholesale fraud, I am not aware that
Prof. Tancangco has ever admitted to error. As long as she insists on her
mistaken analysis of what constitutes election fraud, and on her mistaken
attitude towards Namfrel, then there is a very great danger that, if
confirmed as a Comelec commissioner, Prof. Tancangco will continue with her
irresponsible penchant to see election fraud without logical evidence
thereof, as well as find ways and means to block Namfrel from continuing its
universally-applauded critical role as a citizens' arm for helping to bring
about clean elections in the Philippines.
"Thus, given her demonstrated incompetence in prior election-research, and
her unfounded prejudice towards Namfrel, I think it is most unwise for the
Commission on Appointments to confirm the appointment of Prof. Luz Tancangco
as Comelec Commissioner."
Although the confirmation of Luz Tancangco's appointment was bypassed after
this testimony, unfortunately she was reappointed, and eventually passed the
CA.
Her nomination and reappointment to the Comelec was undoubtedly due to the
influence of presidential brother-in-law Dr. Raul P. de Guzman, former dean
of public administration at U.P., where she was a professor.
It does not require any special expertise to assess the Tancangco research
as worthless. Her writing is gobbledygook. Just try reading her for
yourself, and weep.
If Luz Tancangco's research were any good, then her indictment of Namfrel
ought to be known to all Philippine universities by now. Her research has
been ignored by the social science community, possibly in the hope that she
would just go away and bother no one.
But she is still around, has acquired high office through connections, and
now see what harm she is causing to our sytem of democracy.
"Eternal vigilance is the prize of democracy."
From: "Telibert"
To: namfrel@edsamail.com.ph
Subject: February 8, 2001 Namfrel Press Statement
Date: Thu, 8 Feb 2001 17:02:22 +0800
Press Statement:
"NAMFREL ACCREDITATION TO BE DECIDED ON VALENTINE'S DAY"
February 8, 2001
In a telephone conversation last night with NAMFREL National Chairman Jose
Concepcion, Jr., Commissioner Mehol K. Sadain relayed to NAMFREL the news
that the COMELEC en banc committee decided that Commissioner Luz Tancangco
will no longer be required to pen the majority decision of the committee
that disallows NAMFREL from conducting Operation Quick Count. Instead,
Commissioner Tancangco will prepare a position paper explaining why NAMFREL
should not be accredited to perform quick count.
This will be submitted to the COMELEC Clerk of Court, who in turn shall
issue an order to NAMFREL to appear before the COMELEC en banc and respond
to the position paper.
Chairman Concepcion called COMELEC Acting Chairman Rufino Javier requesting
that Commissioner Tancangco submit the position paper by Friday, February 9,
as agreed upon, in order to give time for NAMFREL to prepare its response
before February 14, Valentine’s day.
Commissioner Sadain has calendared the same for Valentine’s day, and the
Commissioner jokingly remarked to Chairman Concepcion that he hopes that
this will not be a bloody Valentine’s day, ” to which Concepcion replied
that this will turn out to be a Happy Valentine’s day, to which both and
the Acting Chairman Javier agreed.
It has been 117 days since NAMFREL filed its petition to the COMELEC for
accreditation. More than four months later, and with less than a hundred
days before the elections, NAMFREL has yet to receive official word about
its pending application to perform Operation Quick Count, a job the poll
watchdog has been doing since 1984.
No less than former COMELEC Chairman Bernardo Pardo has signified its
appreciation for NAMFREL’s Operation Quick Count in 1998: “ (The COMELEC)
would like to express its profound ‘Thank you’ for the assistance that
NAMFREL rendered to the country during the May 11 National and Local
Elections…Indeed, NAMFREL’s ‘Operation Quick Count…’ contributed to the
public’s acceptance of the electoral results.”
From: "Telibert"
To: namfrel@edsamail.com.ph
Subject: Press Statement
Date: Wed, 7 Feb 2001 19:11:01 +0800
Press Statement:
"Namfrel Questions Delay Accreditation"
07 February 2001
The National Citizens' Movement for Free Elections (Namfrel) questions the
delay in the decision of the Comelec to accredit Namfrel for operation
quick count in the May 14, 2001 elections.
Namfrel filed its petition for accreditation on October 25, 2000 and it was
formally heard on November 14, 2000. In December, Namfrel was informed by
then-Chairman Harriet Demetriou that a draft resolution granting
accreditation and authorizing Namfrel to do a quick count was being routed
to all Commissioners.
However, Commissioner Tancangco raised objections to the accreditation and
did not act on the draft resolution.
Tancangco has alleged that based on her study of the 1987 elections,
Namfrel's Operation Quick Count (OQC) with regard to the senatorial count
had:
1) discrepancies or adjustments between regional totals and provincial/
district breakdowns;
2) a highly improbable fill-up rate; and
3) Namfrel's partial count being greater than the final complete count of
the Comelec.
This study was released in 1991 and was immediately criticized by
professors of the University of the Philippines. Former Dean of the UP
School of Economics Jose Encarnacion wrote on April 3, 1991 "Much of the
discussion in this paper strikes me as just funny (because the reasoning is
so queer), and since it is not meant to be a humorous piece but a serious
academic study, I have to conclude that this paper is simply an incompetent
treatment of the subject."
In the third week of January, the Comelec, in a 5-2 en banc decision chose
not to accredit Namfrel for OQC but instead accredited it as a citizens
arm. The majority decision was supposed to be written by Commissioner
Tancangco. However, no decision has been released thus, preventing Namfrel
from preparing its formal response to the Comelec en banc.
On January 23, 2001, Commissioner Mehol Sadain stated in a memorandum to
the Commission En-Banc that "the issues raised by Commissioner Tancangco be
formally relayed to Namfrel for its comments before a final decision is
reached on the petition".
"With this resolution we look forward to presenting our case before the
Comelec to debunk once and for all the accusations of Commissioner
Tancangco against Namfrel," chairman Jose Concepcion, Jr. said.
In the meantime, lawyer Jose Bernas has filed a motion for Tancangco to
not participate in the discussions on the accreditation citing that
Namfrel "may not benefit from the cold neutrality of an impartial judge
that the law requires in any judicial or quasi-judicial hearing." "One
cannot be accuser and judge at the same time, this is not right," Bernas
said.
Since 1984 the Comelec has granted Namfrel accreditation as citizens arm
with 13 accreditations to conduct the Operation Quick Count or OQC.
Namfrel was even granted three accreditations to do the quick count for the
Pasay, Lucena City and Mercedes, Camarines Norte recall elections in 2000
with Tancangco herself favoring Namfrel's parallel count.
Namfrel's count has been domestically and internationally hailed as a
significant involvement and contribution by non-partisan citizens to
achieve clean and honest elections. "The OQC remains an effective
deterrent against dagdag-bawas or manipulation in the counting of votes as
long as the election process, especially the counting of votes remain
manual and the boards of election inspectors tally 250 names of national
and local candidates," Concepcion added.
"We believe our people would want to see Namfrel active in this most
important elections after EDSA People Power II. Namfrel, therefore, sees
it part of the efforts to convince Comelec, the new commissioners, that it
be given the accreditation to conduct the parallel count. We will do our
best to get the accreditation because we cannot disappoint our people,"
Concepcion concluded.
"Eternal vigilance is the prize of democracy."
From: "Telibert"
To: namfrel@edsamail.com.ph
Subject: Malaya article on Joe Concepcion
Date: Wed, 17 Jan 2001 17:40:36 +0800
Joecon explains
(From the column of Ducky Paredes, Malaya, Jan. 13, 2001)
Joe Concepcion called to explain that he and Cardinal Ricardo Vidal went to
Malacañang primarily to brief the President on the need to use computers in
the forthcoming elections. He told the President that Canada had some
voting computers that we could lease from Canada and which they had offered
to us for free.
He explained to Erap that the forthcoming elections where we could have
more than 200 party list candidates would be a very difficult one for the
teachers to do manually. They would have to list down the votes of all of
these 200 or so plus the senatorial, the congressional and the local
candidates from mayor and governor to councilors and provincial board
members.
We have to computerize, he told the President, in order to assure that the
elections will be clean and orderly. Joe said that the President thanked
him for this and agreed that elections must be clean. Erap said that he
himself had been the victim of fraudulent elections and wanted to make sure
that the forthcoming one would be acceptable to the people and to the
world. Thus, the computerization to be done through the leasing of machines
for free from Canada is presently under study.
Cardinal Vidal then brought up the fact that a new Comelec chairman would
have to be chosen soon. The Cardinal said that although they would have
wanted Fr. Joaquin Bernas, S.J., this could not be. The President agreed,
according to Joe, that Bernas was a good choice but wanted to know why
Bernas could not take the job. Bernas was a Jesuit, Vidal explained, and
the Jesuits have an absolute prohibition against accepting government jobs.
Thus, Bernas could not be Comelec chairman. The President asked if
there was anything that the Cardinal could do about that and Vidal said
that he did not think so. There was nothing he could do about Bernas and
the Jesuits.
Joe says that they also talked about other candidates for Comelec chairman
explaining to the President that he did not even want to talk to any of
them if the President did not approve of them. What was the point of
talking to them if the President, as the appointing power, objected to
them? The President then cleared two names from the ones presented to him
and gave Joe Concepcion the go-ahead to ask both if, should the President
appoint them, they would accept the appointment.
Joe explained that all he wanted out of the Malacañang visit was to help
bring about better elections in May and that there was no politics at all
involved in the visit nor was he playing politics.
Joe said that the President received them well and had a positive reaction
to the visit.
