Jakarta. Two days ahead of the official announcement of the results of the April 9 legislative elections, the General Elections Commission (KPU) had finalized vote counting in only 18 provinces.
“There are 18 provinces [that have been finalized]. Actually, there are 20 provinces, but Central Java and East Nusa Tenggara each had one voting region that have not been finalized,” Ferry Kurnia Rizkiyansyah, KPU commissioner, said at the elections body’s offices in Jakarta on Wednesday.
The 18 provinces include Jakarta, Bali, Riau, Banten, Yogyakarta, Bangka Belitung, Jambi, Gorontalo, Central Sulawesi, South Sulawesi, Aceh, Lampung, West Sumatra, West Nusa Tenggara, South Kalimantan, West Kalimantan, Central Kalimantan and West Papua.
But Ferry remained optimistic that the KPU would manage to finalize the vote count process in every province before the Friday deadline.
“We are doing our best because this is a deadline set by law, that is why it has to be finalized by May 9,” he said.
In Jakarta, the final vote count from three of the capital’s voting areas showed that the Indonesia Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), which according to quick counts won the legislative elections with some 19 percent of the votes, had earned 1,410,173 votes with other political parties trailing far behind.
The Great Indonesia Movement party (Gerindra), for example, received 610,780 votes, while the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) reportedly got 537,905.
The first voting area to be finalized was the Jakarta I area, comprising East Jakarta, followed by Jakarta III, which covers West Jakarta, North Jakarta and the Thousand Islands, while the last area to be finalized was Jakarta II, which comprises Central and South Jakarta as well as overseas voters.
Meanwhile, the total number of suspects involved in election-related violations stood at 379 as of Tuesday.
“Data collected by the Sentra Gakumdu [elections law-enforcement center] as of May 6 shows there are 286 cases with 379 suspects,” National Police spokesperson Sr. Comr. Agus Rianto said at the police headquarters on Wednesday.
Cases of money politics dominate the list with 77, followed by 44 cases of multiple voting and 22 of campaigning outside of the scheduled period. Other cases include the use of state facilities in campaigning and the damaging of election props.
“Twelve of the 379 suspects are village chiefs, 98 members of campaign teams, 66 are legislative candidates, 38 are members of the elections committee, including civil servants and party officials,” Agus said.
Ferry emphasized that the discovery of violations throughout the vote count process were the result of transparency and accountability within the KPU.
“The KPU provided the space for political parties’ witnesses and DPD [Regional Representatives Council] candidates to express their concerns, as long as they are followed by evidence. We continue to push for the synchronization of data so that the results can be received by political parties’ witnesses and DPD candidates,” he said.
He added that the KPU also continued to look into cases where there were data discrepancies.
“We did not ignore these things, but we discussed it with the witnesses of political parties and the Elections Monitoring Board [Bawaslu]. We cross-checked data to the database by reviewing the provincial vote count results, and in some cases we would even recheck the C1 and C1 plano forms,” he said, referring to the document that just gives the final figures in one polling station.
Ferry said not every concern directed towards the KPU could be proven.
Source/Fuente: http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/news/final-vote-count-friday-deadline-looms/
