The Electoral Chamber convenes the parties in plenary …

In the midst of the controversy over changes to the provisional control, the National Electoral Chamber summoned all political parties to a hearing. for this Thursday at noon. This is the meeting of the Council of National Parties to be held before each election, in this case the Simultaneous and Compulsory Open Primary (STEP) of 11 August. However, beyond the formality, theThe public will be the theater of opposition issues the decision of the ruling party to change and digitize the data transfer mechanism of each polling station at the Argentinean Post Office.

Judges Santiago Corcuera and Alberto Dalla Vía have outstanding proposals from Frente de Todos and the federal consensus, which they say "safeguard measures guaranteeing the transparency of the process" transmission and provisional counting of votes. It is not excluded that more guarding mechanisms are ordered to the executive power.

Suspicions about the new data transmission system

The government has introduced the new screening method the company SmartMatic. Instead of physically moving the telegrams for the provisional count, now the computer company will scan the telegrams -which will be identified with a code called "Tiff" – and forward them to the courier for a preliminary examination. The system will then transform the Tiff file into a PDF file. This is one of the main issues raised by the parties, it is the system that converts the data, which prevents the control of all those involved in the election.

The data will be transcribed manually only in the mail and then broadcast. This path, between the voting table and the post office, which could previously be the subject of a complete inspection, will now include an electronic step. prevents physical control of all parties.

Before, what was happening was simple: the telegram signed at the tables by the president and the prosecutors was taken to the post office with a chain of custody. Subsequently, it was transmitted as is, in the form of a telegram, to the central office of the post office and transmitted manually to what was reported to the public. At no point in the process has there been file conversion, scanning, or any other electronic method that prevents human control.

Waiting for the hearing before the Electoral Chamber

For this Thursday, the weather should warm up during the hearing before the national electoral chamber. Representatives of the Justicialist Party and Frente de Todos, Jorge Landau and Patricia García Blanco, presented last week a brief in which they put the judges "Technical problems, irregularities and other embarrbading situations" appeared during the last dummy exam, with the intervention of the company.

"We are asking the political parties to have a programmatic interface at the provisional count of the results, which will allow them to consult the data of each of the tables when they are loaded in a digital format, identical to the one that will then be sent at. the media, "the lawyers told the House.

Although magistrates have already argued that provisional control is not the responsibility of the judiciary but of the executive, the opposition will seek to put the issue on the agenda during the hearing. As speculated Pram in dialogue with Page / 12, "that would be logical that the House occupy the position of controller left by the government. This is a modification they have adopted that completely changes the electoral control system. "What they claim about Justicialismo is that political groups can have computer access to image files and their metadata, as they enter different transmission centers.

In an agreement, the National Electoral Chamber has already established that the software should be delivered thirty days before the general elections of October. And, regarding the STEP, the government announced that it would only be available 48 hours in advance. The fact is that the CNE is only competent for the general vote and the final control, and not for the provisional votes. Anyway, It is not excluded that after this week's meeting, the judges order the executive to take some action to ensure transparency of control.