Digital transformation to strengthen public trust in Comelec – poll commissioner

Newly-appointed Commission on Elections (Comelec) Commissioner Nelson Java Celis believes that digital transformation is a way to help the poll body to strengthen the public trust in the institution.

He assured that digitalization will not only improve the effectiveness and ensure the proper implementation of an automated election system but will result in a digital transformation within the institution.

“This will also help the poll body perform a free, honest, credible and modernized electoral exercises, said Celis, also a known IT specialist, business process and change management expert,” he said.

Celis recently took his oath of office as one of the two new Comelec commissioners, along with Atty. Ernesto Maceda, Jr.

He said in a speech that automated elections in the Philippines have improved since 2010, especially when the Comelec implemented the use of digital signatures for the first time during the May 2022 elections.

However, to further improve the efficiency of the poll body in election management, the Comelec official underlined the need for relevant laws to digitalization to build the capacity and readiness of the Comelec to work towards the government’s policy to build an e-Government, and to be able to implement policies on e-Commerce, and e-Governance.

“Digitalization did not start yesterday but decades ago. Related to the Commission on Elections, in 1997, Republic Act No. (RA) 8436 or the Automated Election Law (was enacted) and was amended in 2007,” One of the initiatives of the poll body that will benefit from this would be the “Registration Anywhere” scheme for voter registration.