On May 10, 2010, Filipinos will cast their ballot for president, vice-president, senators, congressmen, governors, mayors and other key offices in their national and local election. For the first time ever, over 50 million voters will vote using new technologies nation-wide–specifically, optical scan voting machines. Technology impacts all aspects of elections; one of the areas that is often most affected by transitions to new technologies is the system of legal complaints and adjudication. 

For an entire week, from February 8 to 12, 2010, IFES and the American Bar Association (ABA), with funding support from USAID, brought two of the foremost legal experts on election adjudication from the US – Minnesota Supreme Court Justice Paul H. Anderson and election law expert John Hardin Young – to Manila in order to meet with the Commission on Elections (COMELEC) and other stakeholders and advise on complaints adjudication with this new technology. Both Justice Anderson and Mr. Young have experience litigating and adjudicating cases using Precinct Count Optical Scan (PCOS) systems, which are similar to those which will be used in the Philippines.

Aside from meeting with COMELEC commissioners and lawyers, Justice Anderson and Mr. Young also met with justices of the Supreme Court and Court of Appeals, prominent legal academics of the Philippine Judicial Academy (PHILJA), staff of the electoral tribunals and the Department of Justice, lawyers from political parties, civil society groups—such as the Legal Network for Truthful Elections (LENTE) and LIBERTAS—and top law firms. On separate occasions they met with the Supreme Court Chief Justice, the Senator and Chairman of the Joint Congressional Oversight Committee, and other COMELEC commissioners and Senior Staff. 

This podcast, moderated by Chad Vickery, IFES regional director for Europe and Asia, is a conversation between these two experts on the topics they covered on their trip to the Philippines.

Listen to the Abridged Podcast »

Read the Full Interview »