Press Release
May 29, 2010

Transcript of Ambush Interview of Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile

SP: PPCRV submitted a partial report. They are continuing the random survey, hopefully on Monday they could finish.

Q: A while ago you asked Smartmatic about the shutdown of the machine?

SP: Yes because it was requested by the technicians of the Senate and the House because they were afraid that the machine will overheat and affect the data embedded in the machines. Smartmatic said it will not overheat, but shutting down would not affect the data.

Q: Hindi ninyo po i-shutdown, sir.

SP: No, we will not shutdown...

Q: As of Speaker Nograles, by Tuesday you will finish the manually transmitted COCs?

SP: Yes, earlier even, on Monday. At the pace we are having, we will be finished by Monday, at the very latest, Tuesday.

Q: Lahat po ba ito parang overseas absentee voting?

SP: Oo. Overseas and local absentee voting.

Q: Will we be able to proclaim the winning candidates before June 30?

SP: That is why we are working until this hour, to finish the canvass because we want to so the proclamation not later than June 15.

Q: Sir, how are you going to address this issue on electronically generated COCs that some of the lawmakers are still questioning?

SP: Well, if they have any evidence that the documents that we received here were tampered, I am willing to entertain them but we will require them to state under oath the evidence. We will not just accept anybody who comes here who says "I was approached this, I was approached that, so and so told me about it." I am a lawyer, I have been trained in the courtroom.

Q: Sir the Speaker said that you are targeting to finish the manually transmitted COCs on Tuesday?

SP: Well, it is the manually generated COCs that will be finished by Tuesday, or by Monday. You can see the pace of the work here.

Q: How about the debate?

SP: We will give them maybe a day to air all of their arguments but we are not going to prolong it.

Q: So just one day for another discussion?

SP: Not one day but we will give them a reasonable time. As I said a day or two days, then we get to the canvass.

Q: So we are expecting that by next week also, by Thursday?

SP: Next week we will go through the electronically transmitted COCs.

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