Election irregularities reported to police
Damar Harsanto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
A number of unsuccessful governor and deputy governor candidates made allegations to the police on Monday that money politics may have tainted the recent gubernatorial election.
"We are here to put pressure on the police, who appear not to be serious in reacting toward public outcry over alleged irregularities in the recent gubernatorial election," said Ahmad Heryawan, one of the unsuccessful candidates, from the Justice Party.
Ahmad attributed the irregularities partly to the action of some councillors, in which they marked the written names of candidates with characters in bold on their ballot papers to indicate they had voted for them.
"Such practice is a violation of electoral procedure, especially with regard to the principle of secrecy, as there were indications of attempts to influence councillors during the election," said Ahmad.
Ahmad was accompanied by Abdul Azis Matnur, secretary of the Jakarta chapter of the Justice Party, and Adang Suhardjo, who represented Abdillah Toha, an unsuccessful deputy governor candidate from the National Mandate Party. Abdillah did not appear as he was abroad.
According to Adang, another unsuccessful governor candidate, Tarmidi Suharjo of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle, who had confirmed his support for the action, could not appear for personal reasons. "His father is sick and Pak Tarmidi has apologized that he could not appear right now," he said.
Adang urged the police to take concrete action, including the summoning of witnesses and seizure of the ballot papers, before the installation of incumbent governor Sutiyoso and his deputy, Fauzi Bowo, slated for Oct. 7.
"This is our last chance to cancel the installation. If the police don't do anything meaningful before that deadline, the public will judge by themselves how poor will have been the police response to an issue of legitimate public concern," said Adang.
City police spokesman Sr. Comr. Anton Bachrul Alam said earlier the police were still investigating the matter.
"Our investigators are still collecting evidence," said Anton.