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Manila Bulletin devider Philippines devider Allocated budget for lease of additional voting machines increased

Allocated budget for lease of additional voting machines increased

Published Oct 14, 2021 01:13 pm

The budget for the lease of 10,000 additional units of vote counting machines (VCMs) to be used for the May 2022 polls has been increased.

Comelec/MB

From P600,503,500, the Commission on Elections (Comelec) has set the Approved Budget for the Contract (ABC) to P864,024,067.

"The Commission intends to apply the sum of P864,024,067 being the ABC to payment under the contract for the Lease of OMR/OPSCAN Precinct Counter with SD Cards for use in the 2022 National and Local Elections - 2nd Bidding," the poll body said in its Invitation to Bid (ITB).

Last month, the Comelec declared a failure of bidding in the first bidding due to lack of bid proposals for the project.

"Considering that there are no bids submitted in today's opening of bids, the Special Bids and Awards Committee (SBAC) hereby declares a failure of bidding," Comelec - SBAC Chairman Atty. Allen Abaya said during the opening of bids for the lease of Optical Mark Reader (OMR) or Optical Scan (OPSCAN) System or Voting/Counting Machine (VCM) with SD Cards.

He said Smartmatic-Total Information Management 2016 Inc. (SMMT-TIM) purchased bid documents last Aug. 13 but did not submit any bid proposal.

Abaya said SMMT-TIM sent them a letter informing them that the approved budget of P600,503,500.00 is "not sufficient" for the project.

Smartmatic said it is very much interested to participate in the endeavor if the budget allocation is "adjusted as provided by the local procurement law to address these pandemic-caused cost increases."

Abaya said the SBAC took note of the manifestation and will "take that into consideration when we conduct the mandatory review."

The lease project will cover 10,000 VCM units as well as 10,000 pieces of Main SD Cards and 10,000 pieces of wormable SD Cards.

The Comelec has set the Pre-Bid Conference on Oct. 22 while the deadline for the submission of bids as well as the opening of bids is on Nov. 8.

Related Tags

Comelec VCMs smartmatic
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