WE Watch Launching Statement

LAUNCHING STATEMENT
February 22, 2010
by Joselito M. Natividad, Lead Convenor WE-Watch

The Philippine government under President Arroyo is now engaged in an ambitious political exercise. It is automating the election system in a country that has uneven access to automation, and under time constraints that compel abridgement of requisites for its successful implementation.

We in the Philippine labor sector are not against the automation of this important tool of governance, nor are we traditionalists rejecting technological advancement in the country’s political institutions. What we are against is the precipitate manner with which the automated election system (AES) is being deployed, and the propagation of the falsehood that automation in itself reduces or even eliminates electoral fraud.

The root causes of this country’s blemished electoral track record go down much deeper than the election system on which it runs. They lie not in faulty methods used for voting or canvassing, but in the pervasive mind-set among candidates that regard running for office as a business investment. They lie in social inequities and other injustices that ensure continued political leverage to those have the most in life while perpetuating the marginalization of those who have the least. In this milieu the basic right to suffrage becomes violated, including that of workers who are not able to move as a body to fight against fraud.

Too long has the labor sector been a mute witness to foul machinations that resurrect themselves every election. With some 75% of the current electorate belonging to the laboring strata of Philippine society either as formals or as informals, the labor sector presents a huge potential in the popular advocacy of ensuring the integrity of the upcoming elections.

By way of initializing this potential, we launch today our very own Workers’ Electoral Watch or WE-Watch. Composed mainly of big unions and other labor organizations in the Philippines, our watchgroup will educate worker-voters on the AES and its vulnerabilities and conduct its own monitoring of fraud through the use of readily available technology among Filipinos – the cellphone. After gathering a body of evidence on the implementation of the AES, we will make public our findings, assist in the necessary prosecution of fraud perpetrators and put forward policy recommendations to the Philippine government and the international community regarding electoral fraud and automation.

With this step, workers will be able to channel their own sectoral stream of fraud monitoring to the mainstream people’s movement for clean elections. With the formation of this non-partisan network of worker-volunteers, we commit ourselves to promoting good governance, human rights and social justice. #