Rappler Talk: Giving Comelec a new image

MANILA, Philippines – Immediately after taking his oath as the Philippines’ elections chief in May, Commission on Elections (Comelec) Chairman Andres Bautista had no time for warm-ups.

Bautista led the Comelec in dealing with an unprecedented crisis, prompted by a Supreme Court (SC) ruling that rendered 81,000 vote-counting machines useless.

The Comelec resolved this crisis on August 13, as it decided to use the voting machines of controversial firm Smartmatic in the presidential elections in May 2016. Election watchdogs, however, continued to challenge the Comelec ruling.

While the Comelec deals with these issues, a question remains: Who is Comelec Chairman Andres Bautista?

Rappler sat down with Bautista for a profile interview, where the Comelec chairman stressed one of his top priorities: Giving the Comelec a new image.

“Perception is reality,” the 51-year-old Bautista quoted Plato as saying.

The first thing he did in the Comelec, in fact, had something to do with image. He said it was to ask the Comelec’s spokesman, James Jimenez, to shave. “We want to project clean elections,” Bautista told Jimenez. “You have to look clean as well.”

He added, “The medium is the message.” – Rappler.com