HEADLINES: US court indicts ex-Comelec chief | August 10, 2024
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READ: US court indicts ex-Comelec chief
FORMER Commission on Elections (Comelec) chairman Andres Bautista and three executives of the company that provided the automated vote-counting machines for the 2016 elections in the Philippines were indicted on Friday (Manila time) by a federal grand jury in Florida for bribery and money laundering. The company that allegedly bribed Bautista was not named in US court records, but the description in an affidavit matched that of Smartmatic, which had won every contract to supply Comelec with voting machines since the first automated elections were held in 2010. Charged with Bautista were Smartmatic President and General Manager Roger Alejandro Pinate, Vice President for External Operations Jorge Miguel Vasquez, and Vice President for Global Services Elie Moreno. Bautista on Friday said that the charges against him were politically motivated. The four defendants were each charged with one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering and three counts of international laundering of monetary instruments. Pinate and Vasquez were each charged with one count of conspiracy to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) and one substantive violation of the FCPA. If convicted, the four face a 20-year prison term for each count of international laundering of monetary instruments and conspiracy to commit money laundering. Pinate and Vasquez also face five years in prison for the FCPA and conspiracy to violate the FCPA counts. Based on court records, between 2015 and 2018, Smartmatic executives paid a bribe of at least $1 million to Bautista, the Comelec chairman at the time, to ensure that Smartmatic won the contract for vote counting machines and election services for the 2016 polls. More than 92,000 counting machines were used to digitize ballots and transmit the results for canvassing.
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