Inquirer.net reported last Friday the arrival of  an initial batch of electronic voting and counting machines from Smartmatic-TIM Corporation.

Here's the report:

Vote-counting machines arrive from Taiwan
By Kristine L. Alave
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 19:25:00 10/02/2009

Filed Under: Government, Elections, Eleksyon 2010, News

MANILA, Philippines—About 20 electronic voting and counting machines from election provider Smartmatic TIM Corp., which will be used for the training of Board of Election Inspectors, arrived in Manila this week, Comelec spokesman James Jimenez said Friday.

Jimenez said the machines arrived of Monday from Taiwan, where the company manufactures the Precinct Count Optical Scan (PCOS) machines.

Jimenez said the equipment was now at the Bureau of Customs.

The initial batch of machines will be used to train election workers in the 2010 national elections.

Jimenez said the Comelec will start training teachers around January, about the same time Smartmatic TIM completes its delivery of over 82,000 ballot scanners.

The Comelec, he noted, is preparing the list of BEIs to ensure that they have no relatives running for an elective post in their precinct.

Unlike in past elections, where voters wrote down the names of their choices on a blank ballot, voters next year will shade spaces next to the names of the candidates printed on the ballots.

The ballot will then be fed into a scanner. The Comelec said PCOS would lessen the window for cheating and would enable fast canvassing.

Take note of that last line "...PCOS would lessen the window for cheating." Notice that the Comelec didn't say the machines would eliminate cheating. Why is that? Perhaps, Comelec is just being realistic. It is merely acknowledging the fact that some unscrupulous individuals or groups will still try to beat the system. That is the sad fact about elections anywhere there will always be cheating or at least attempts to cheat.

The good news is with PCOS (Precinct Count Optical Scan) cheating is at least minimized. Clearly, that already represents a move forward.