The seven-hour glitch

“They’ll be asked nothing about their absurd justifications, born in the shadow of the total lie.” – Otto Rene Castillo, Apolitical Intellectuals

WITH the President’s favored senatorial slate dominating the recently concluded midterm polls, many of this administration’s apologists interpret this phenomenon as validation of its supposed war on drugs.

The Commission on Human Rights puts the killings brought about by the war on drugs at 27,000 drug “suspects” killed. Although the Philippine National Police has a lower figure of those killed in the last three years at 5,300 people, mostly urban poor, it could not be denied that this is an unprecedented carnage.

Many apologists were quick to point out that the midterm polls win of this administration meant that the people “have spoken” in support of the war on drugs with no less than Foreign Affairs Sec. Teodoro Locsin Jr. leading the pack.

However, the seven-hour glitch of the Commission on Election’s “transparency server” has effectively put a cloud of doubt on the winners at the senatorial polls. From 0.4 percent of all precincts nationwide uploaded to Comelec’s server at around 6:15 pm Monday last week, it suddenly jumped to 90.57 percent of total precincts in the wee hours of Tuesday.

I’m sure everyone who followed the midterm polls closely has heard of Comelec’s reasons for the server glitch. Comelec Commissioner Rowena Guanzon explained that the data packets “flooded” their server after they simultaneously received the digital election returns.

Comelec Commissioner Marlon Casquejo offered a more technical reason for the glitch but hidden in jargon by saying that a “java error” was the reason for the seven-hour glitch of their transparency server.

Let me remind you, my readers, that this is not the first time that Comelec has handled automated elections. The 2019 midterm polls was the fourth time they have handled automated elections in the country. Voters started shading ovals next to the names of candidates in the 2010 presidential elections. Given that they have been at it for four polls already, shouldn’t they be good at it?

An election advocacy group compared the 2016 and this year’s election. The results are staggering if not starkly points out the inefficiency of Comelec. In the 2016 polls, there were 120 secure digital memory cards that malfunctioned, 801 vote counting machines malfunctioned, and there was a 10-minute glitch in Comelec’s server. In comparison, the recently concluded elections showed that 1,665 SD cards malfunctioned, 961 VCMs malfunctioned, and the controversial seven-hour glitch in its server.

With those figures, don’t the voters have the right to question the outcome of the midterm polls?

Carlos Conde, Asia researcher for New York-based Human Rights Watch, pointed out that Ronald dela Rosa, one of the biggest winners in the elections, “may still have a date with justice.” Remember that dela Rosa was one of the foremost architects of the drug war.

“However one views the election results, it won’t change the fact that victorious candidates implicated in ‘drug war’ crimes shouldn’t receive a get-out-of-jail-free card,” Conde said in a statement.

For me, the recently concluded midterm elections are neither validation nor approbation of the President’s “war on drugs” but a confirmation that voters can easily be misrepresented in an election.

As a colleague succinctly puts it: “Comelec has spoken, not the people.”

Not today

WHERE will these social media trolls go now that the midterm elections are over? I guess they will go into hibernation and will go on hyperdrive again in 2022. However, I must say I learned a lot from these trolls during the campaign period up to the very end.

On Friday, in their attempt at a Hail Mary pass, trolls circulated a supposed disqualification decision against Mayor Oscar Moreno that was allegedly penned by Comelec Commissioner Luie Tito Guia of the Commission’s 2nd Division.

The photos of the supposed hard copies of the decision were posted on Facebook first by the incorrigible DDS News-CDO and were further circulated on the social media platform through their most active trolls like “Jojo Cruz” and “Jose Ma. Guerrero.”

On that same Friday night, local reporters were all abuzz after receiving a forwarded copy of the same digital photos posted by DDS News-CDO earlier from Nicole Managbanag, media liaison for the Padayon Pilipino-Centrist-Centrist Democratic Party’s Jose Gabriel La Viña.

As to how Managbanag got hold of the digital copy that DDS News-CDO posted on its Facebook wall is for you to analyze. I will not deprive you of the delight in making that link.

Just a cursory scan of the document, any journalist worth his salt could see a lot of irregularities, up to a point where it’s almost glaring and apologetically fake.

The discrepancies:

• The order was supposedly promulgated on the International Labor Day — May 1.

• It is not printed on a legal-size bond paper.

• It does not have the dry seal of the Commission.

• Even the font used is not what the Commission uses in the documents.

• The order was not uploaded in the Commission’s official website.

All of that irregularities could be vetted with a cursory check on Google and plain common sense. However, when I saw that the order’s supposed ponente, Guia, I started to doubt that the document could be real.

As a backgrounder, the commissioner and I go a long way back. He was the chairman of an electoral advocacy group of lawyers and paralegals called Legal Network for Truthful Elections or Lente. This group tied up with the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism for a campaign project of Comelec for the 2013 midterm elections.

I thought, what better way to have the document checked than to directly ask the commissioner who supposedly signed the order.

“Officially I am saying that Resolution you showed me is fake. The second division did not issue that resolution,” Guia told me Friday night.

What the local media did, both collectively and individually, showed the trolls and their shadowy masters that when we say no to fake news, we mean it.

Kudos to all the journalists and broadcasters who did not bite the bait for a supposed scoop.

In the words of Arya Stark, the local media said “Not today,” to fake newsmakers.

My criteria

IT will be exactly six days until the midterm elections when this column sees print. So, I would like to share with you, my dear readers, my criteria in choosing the candidates who will land on my final list for the polls, less than a week from now.

But before all that, I think a disclaimer of sorts is in order. First, people tend to forget that journalists, like any law-abiding citizen in this Republic, can also be registered voters. We may not cloud our reports with our personal biases, but it is there. It is a tight-rope act.

So, I just hope my editor-in-chief will not begrudge me of this moment of showing my bias against candidates whom I think will not serve me and my family’s agenda for a better society.

Here goes:

First, it is important to me that the candidate has a good sense of humor. There have been a number of studies into this which points that people with a good sense of humor are likely to be more intelligent than the unfunny people.

Lowri Dowthwaite, a lecturer on psychological interventions in the University of Central Lancashire, wrote that researchers in Austria have discovered that funny people, particularly those who enjoy dark humor, have higher IQs (Intelligence Quotients) than their less funny counterparts. The research also pointed out that it takes cognitive and emotional ability to process and produce humor.

“Their analysis shows that funny people have higher verbal and non-verbal intelligence, and they score lower in mood disturbance and aggressiveness,” Dowthwaite’s article reads.

For me, people who are funny tend not to be uptight or act like an erect male member. This kind of candidates is the kind who refer to themselves in the third person. Like, they are endorsing a brand or something. It seems unnerving to me.

Second, I want a candidate with an above average intelligence. It would even help if the candidate has an IQ north of 120. Like what my boss told me, “I don’t want to be brighter or more intelligent than somebody in Congress.”

As manang Rhona Canoy would say: “People who are three donuts short of a dozen.”

These two criteria are closely related as I have mentioned above. Studies show that when you experience a positive emotional state, like laughing, it increases the production of dopamine in your brain. Dopamine opens up the learning centers of our brains. As a result, funny and intelligent people are more flexible and creative in their thinking process. This, in turn, aid them to be better at solving complex and daunting problems.

Unfortunately, most of the incumbents in both houses of Congress are as dim as the gaslights in the houses in rural areas. Let’s not add insult to injury by voting dumb senator wannabes. Instead, let’s help restore the luster of our Republic’s Congress.

Lastly, I want empathy back in our legislative branch and our local government units. As we have experienced these past three years, we have had enough of impunity and negativity in the executive branch.

Performance coach and human behavior professor Melody Wilding writes: “In a busy, complex, stressful world, empathy is the glue that holds relationships together. Whether you want to connect with your colleagues, customers, or children, you need to master the art of empathetic communication.”

Wilding defines empathy as the ability to detect other people’s emotions and understand their perspective. “When people feel accepted and validated, it builds trust,” she adds. Wouldn’t it be better if we have empathic politicos as opposed to having polarizing ones?

This administration has been selling fear and hatred like pancakes. To me, it is starting to sound like a “folk” song — where our President has been cursing: Folk this and folk that. Personally, I think his brand of semantics, or the lack of it, is getting kind of tiring to the ears, hearts, and our brains. It has contributed in the general dumbing down of our country. Don’t contribute to that kind of society, please.

So, there you have it. My three criteria in choosing a candidate this coming election — a sense of humor, intelligence, and empathy. Now that we have the opportunity to put a semblance of balance in the three branches of government, we should use our votes wisely. See you at the polling places.

‘Unity March’

THE election period for the 2019 mid-term elections started on Sunday. Here in Cagayan de Oro, it was opened with a so-called “Unity March.” Started with a march, local candidates held an interfaith prayer rally and capped it off with a peace covenant signing at Kiosko Kagawasan in Divisoria.

The Commission on Elections in Northern Mindanao, officials of Camp Alagar and the Army’s 4th Infantry Division, and city hall employees attended Sunday’s activity. Camp Alagar spokesman Surki Sereñas posted on his Facebook wall: “United for honest, credible, and peaceful 2019 elections.”

Scanning through my Facebook newsfeed on Sunday, I saw photos of the event. I saw a picture of Centrist Democratic Party candidates posing with administration candidates of PDP-Laban.

Curiously, I did not see erstwhile political kingpin Dongkoy Emano and his supporters at the event. Now, I know you’d say to lay off him since he’s too old for such an event. But I could also return the question back to you. Why is he running if he can’t give his time for such an event?

I say that the message of the unity walk should be that even though they are political opponents this May, they are united in wanting to serve the people of Cagayan de Oro.

Are they too good for the electorate that they can’t get their butts off their stately mansions? As commissioner Luie Guia posted on his wall, the mid-term polls are first and foremost, for the voters.

I commented on Sereñas’s Unity March post, rhetorically asking if the absence of some candidates meant that they did not want an honest, credible, and peaceful May polls. First, he laughed at such non sequitur but then, good man that he is, he followed up by saying: “Of course not… ang uban basin naay equally important commitment.”

The last part of the sentence reminded me of Dongkoy’s default excuse for his absences when he served (or the lack of it) as vice mayor of the city — “attending to more important matters.”

This coming May, Dongkoy will be running again for vice mayor. I repeat my question from my September 2015 column: When you’re the vice mayor, what could possibly be more important than presiding over the city council? When he was vice mayor, he attended a total of TWO regular sessions. He attended only the inaugural and the closing sessions of the city council.

If these candidates can’t give us their time for an activity this simply because of “more important matters,” why run at all? Pfft.

Upping the Ante

LATE last week, a politician ranted on a live Facebook session about trolls, allegedly maintained by city hall, who were attacking him. It was surreal.

On one hand, it was interesting to see the man, fairly or unfairly referred to as the “father of trolls,” squirm at the proposition that his group is getting a dose of its own medicine — trolling. For the politician to go online and preach about the ills of trolling is nothing short of a standup comedy. It was full of irony, not to mention, nonsequiturs.

I doubt if we can trust anyone seeking an elected government position who spends a lot of time lurking on social media platforms than engaging people in the real world setting. I’ve always found that sinister. Case in point: The Donald.

On the other hand, you have a mayor wannabe who has all the time in the world to be concerned with the social media buzz about him.

I’d like to point out that the man has been referred to as the social media director the President’s cyber-troops during the 2016 presidential campaign.

No less than a study of the University of Oxford found that the President’s group spent around P10 million to hire trolls who would spread propaganda for the then-presidential candidate and to target those who were against him.

The study, titled “Troops, trolls, and troublemakers: A global inventory of organized social media manipulation,” found that the poison of choice of trolls and their handlers involve “verbal abuse, hate speech, and discrimination against the values, beliefs or identity of a user or a group of users online.” Netizens were dumbfounded and couldn’t help but be silenced online.

I found the rant of the “social media director” last week to be ironic. Given what his group’s social media operators did in 2016, he should be the last entity to lash out at trolling.

I have always believed that negative or “black” campaigning will never prosper in a relatively small town of electorates. This scheme of deception online might have worked in the national scale as we have seen in the last national elections, but I doubt it would work in a more intimate and constricted space like Cagayan de Oro, a city where almost everyone is either related or at least knows everybody in government service.

It is what I love about this city. Although it has been included in the Top 10 list of the most competitive cities in Mindanao (ranked second), it has managed to maintain its “barriotic” character. While it has become a relative metropolis, one could still ask a neighbor for cooking oil, salt, and other mundane domestic needs.

In the end, what matters is how well our politicians have presented themselves in the real world because, by now, people have realized about the machinations in the social media platforms.

The city electorate cares much more about how these candidates are going to forge a better city than to listen to or read their mudslingings. That is why we have launched the “100% Politics” in our paper.

Through that democratic space, we do not write about what the candidates intend to do once in office but their group’s representatives do. Through this space, voters would see which group has the intellectual stamina and zest for public service.

One editor puts it this way: “If the groups cannot present and articulate their ideas, more so submit articles about what they stand for and about their platforms of government, then why are they running in the first place?”

I agree with that. So far, at least two groups have articulated their visions for the future of the city and the province based on my own scorecard. The others have contained their articles to praising the exploits of their individual candidates.

The city’s or the province’s experiences have shown us that it doesn’t take one individual but a collective effort of a group to realize their vision of development. It is elementary to deduce that without a clear vision, mission, and goal, these groups could be bereft of public service in mind but individual political ambition. In both characteristics, by the way, the city or the province lose.

Ever hopeful as I am, I am looking forward to more substantial and intellectually stimulating articles in this paper’s “100% Politics.” Anyway, there’s still time to make a turnaround and show their respective constituents what they’re made of.

I’ll be crossing my fingers and toes.

Game of trolls

I ADMIT I was overwhelmed by how troll farms and their handlers took social media platforms in the 2016 national elections by storm. It was anything short of “shock and awe.” They dominated discussion boards, bullied thought leaders and mainstream news media into virtual silence, at least for a while.

But like my friends and colleagues, I was unprepared then. I didn’t know that there were people who would go to any lengths just so their principal would win. I didn’t know they would co-opt and sully free speech on the Internet. I admit I was naive.

With the mid-term elections just around the corner, we can be sure trolls will come out of the woodwork and go into hyperdrive again as they are wont to do. Even though its main handler has yet to come out (pun intended), we need to be ready for the expected coming onslaught of trolls in our social media accounts.

So, for those of you who have been hiding under a rock, this is how these vile creatures operate on social media platforms.

Trolls and their handlers employ a two-pronged approach against critical discussions — stifling dissent through fear and scripted messaging through fake news and black propaganda.

They stifle dissent through fear and intimidation. It got to a point where people were afraid to register their critical observations lest they would be the subject of a coordinated troll attack and be branded “delawan,” “adik” or terrorist protector. Obviously, there are people who have been exempt of this fear. Some of my colleague-friends fought toe-to-toe with these trolls. Still, a significant number of them just resigned not to engage the trolls.

They drown out public discussions with their slew of ad hominems, non-sequiturs, and other fallacious arguments that don’t have Latin names.

You may be tempted to dismiss these trolls as a bunch of uncouth and unloved creatures, most of them may well be but that’s not the point. Never make the mistake of underestimating these trolls. If there’s anything these trolls have been doing, it is anything but disorganized and uncalibrated.

My friend BenCyrus Ellorin has encapsulated their modus operandi on his wall quite brilliantly.

Step 1. Trolls would populate Cagayan de Oro social media groups–they have already begun. A case in point was when a Facebook user suddenly engaged my sarcastic comment on a thread at Bantay Kagay-an Facebook group.

I got this troll’s panty in a twist because I like the critical thinking La Viña brother over its principal. For context, this troll asked me to prove that I’m a real “real” Kagay-anon because it took my sarcastic quip as questioning the lineage of its principal in Cagayan de Oro.

I replied that I didn’t have to validate my lineage to something that is called a “Flick-g Spot.” It has since changed its handle to “Taga CDO Ka.”

When I first checked out the troll’s account, I found that it joined Facebook on Oct. 7, 2018. However, when I checked it again yesterday, it somehow turned the social media clock and now appears to have joined Facebook in July of 2015. It has 119 friends, all of whom (I should say “which”) have dubious names and equally suspicious profile photos.

Of the 12 pages it “liked,” eight were Cagayan de Oro-based and one page of a government official, Pompee La Viña.

Although I have responded to his attacks about me being an “impostor Kagay-anon,” it has nevertheless used my account as click-bait to create online noise.

Step 2. These trolls will create “click-bait” posts to generate traffic. This will then lead to the propagation of fake news.

So, despite my knowledge of trolls, I admit I fell right into its trap. I am now its click-bait to generate traffic since I am a legit netizen of Facebook with real people as friends. As my friends react to his ridiculous post on my thread in the group, this legitimizes its account, and by extension its dubious network of friends.

This troll can then start propagating fake news on the different Facebook groups of Cagayan de Oro City. Aside from Bantay Kagay-an, Taga CDO Ka has now joined Ang Baruganan Region 10, Ang Baruganan Philippines, and Iligan City “a walk to be remembered” v1.

According to Freedom House, the Philippines is among the other 30 countries across the globe that has deployed “manipulation to distort online information” (read: fake news).

These trolls don’t operate out of loyalty or dedication to their principals. Troll farms are big business.

A study by Chay Hofileña entitled “Fake accounts and manufactured reality on social media” shows these trolls are getting paid.

“In one page for commercial purposes, for example, repeated call-outs were made for ‘business partners’ who were required in 2015 to spend three to five hours daily on Facebook. Payment was supposed to range conservatively from P1,000 a day to P10,000 a month, with training provided,” Hofileña’s study reads in part.

There are even reports that some trolls even get paid as much as P2,000 to P3,000 a day just to copy-paste content. As Rappler has uncovered recently, trolls have uniform posts or comments on social media platforms.

“Different versions of what is supposed to be the one true fact can be manufactured, creating confusion and deep-seated schisms among groups who get to believe that their version of the truth is what is real and correct,” Hofileña’s study further reads.

So, how do we combat these trolls and their brand of twisted reality?

• Be critical with every post on social media. Use Google to vet, validate, and corroborate what is being asserted in a post or comment.
• Expose and oppose fake accounts, trolls, and bots. Bots are bits of code designed to mimic human users. They sound high-tech but believe me when I say these have been deployed in the country’s social media platforms as early as 2014.
• Actively reclaim your social media space by using apps that automatically label fake news and fake news websites as such. Let me plug the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines’ award-winning “fakeblok.”

Fakeblok is an extension app for Google Chrome web browsers and calls your attention when links from websites that tend to post fake news appear on your Facebook newsfeed. The app uses the database by the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility.

Again, let us not fall for fake news and reclaim our social media space. Good day and good luck, Kagay-an.