The Commission on Elections (Comelec) on Monday said there will be no delay in the payment of allowances for some 300,000 public school teachers who will be appointed as chairmen and members of the Board of Election Inspectors (BEI) for the May 10, 2010 fully automated polls.

The poll body said each teacher performing poll duties as BEI member will be paid P3,000 for every day of service compared to P1,000 per day in past elections.

Aside from the P3,000 honoraria for every day of service, each BEI member will also be given P300 transportation allowance, a separate P500 for the inspection, verification and sealing of the book of voters, and another P500 for the inspection, verification and sealing of the Precinct Count Optical Scan (PCOS) machine, for a total of P4,300.

As in past elections rendered by the Comelec manually, each of the BEI members, composed of a chairman, vice chairman and poll clerk, who are all public school teachers will conduct the counting of votes in the precinct level.

This year’s prompt payment of teachers’ per diems is provided in the Memorandum of Agreement which Comelec Chairman Jose Melo and Secretary Lesli Lapus of the Department of Education signed recently.

The MOA likewise provides that each of the school heads, principals and supervisors who are not members of the BEI but who will supervise certain precincts will also receive P3,000, while janitors and messengers assigned during the election will get P1,500. Members of the board of canvassers in the municipal, city and provincial levels will get P5,000.

As part of the teachers’ compensation, Comelec agreed under the MOA to set aside P30 million for election-related death or injuries that may be sustained by DepEd employees. The heirs of the deceased DepEd official or employee of DepEd will receive P200,000 in death benefits, the MOA stated.

Meanwhile, Comelec officials emphasized they are right on schedule in preparing for the May polls although critics said they should have already began training teachers who will operate the voting machines.

In a forum entitled “e-leksyon: The 2010 voters’ empowerment series” sponsored by ABS-CBN, Comelec officials assured the public that the local and national polls would push through despite anticipated glitches.

Tony Tinio, National President of the Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT), expressed concern over the delay of the announced training for teachers that should have started last January 21.

“There are 76,000 clustered precincts in all, and teachers should be DOST-certified as Information Technology capable. There are 76,000 teachers that should be trained; where are the trainors? Who will do the trainings?’” he asked.

Comelec Commissioner Gregorio Larrazabal replied that they are constantly coordinating with the DepEd on the training schedule and gave assurance that the delay in training will not affect the conduct of elections in May.

“People are skeptical but what is important is we are constantly coordinating with the DepEd… the best way to prove to skeptics that it can be done is to just do it,” he said.

Smartmatic President for Asia-Pacific Cesar Flores also assured that the delay in schedule will not affect polls since the voting machines are relatively easy to operate and do not require intensive training.

“The operation of the machine is very simple. It is pretty much plug in, turn on, press start, press close, plug in modem and transmit,” Flores said.

But the Smartmatic official said the DepEd should also fast-track the selection of teachers who will man the voting precincts.

“As far as I understand, the selection of teachers is hardly finished, so how can you train them if you haven’t selected them?” he asked.

The Smartmatic-TIM Corp. consortium won the bid for the supply of machines for the country’s first nationwide automated polls. The company said it has procured 5,000 satellite antennas that will be used in areas with no mobile phone signals.

Flores said they have conducted a survey and have pinpointed 35 percent of the total number of precincts that need antennas.

“We are now on the second stage which is analyzing the data in order to know which precincts can share antenna,” he said.