EU sends more 5 July observers

Kurniawan Hari and Sari P. Setiogi, Jakarta

An additional group of 132 poll observers have joined the European Union Election Observation Mission (EU EOM) for the July 5 presidential election.

The short-term observers, 128 from EU member states and four from Switzerland, will join the mission that was established in March, which consists of 12 experts, 68 long-term observers and 17 locally recruited observers.

"Five different teams will be deployed in each province. They will observe the election day in urban and rural areas," said EU EOM chief observer Glyn Ford here on Wednesday.

He said the short-term observers would travel across the country to monitor the voting, the vote counting, and the tabulation.

The work of the short-term observers, the long-term observers in the field over the past weeks, and the core team in Jakarta will allow the EU EOM to make an independent and impartial assessment of the presidential election, Ford said.

He added that the EOM mission would announce the results of its observation on July 8.

Deputy chief observer Oskar Lehner said the mission would also observe the activities in rural areas.

The EU mission has picked Aceh, North Sumatra, Riau, Jambi, South Sulawesi, Lampung, East Kalimantan, South Kalimantan, North Sulawesi, South Sulawesi, Ambon, Papua, and all provinces in Java as the areas where observers will monitor the poll.

EU election analyst Domenico Tuccinardi said the long-term observers had been monitoring the election preparations in the provinces over the past three weeks.

Asked if the EU mission had found irregularities, Ford said that the preparation was good so far. "There is no substantial problem," he said.

Separately, the EU mission observed that the control mechanism during the election process was working.

"(The control mechanism) within the KPU, Panwaslu and the very top level, the Constitutional Court, is functioning," Lehner told the press during his visit to the office of the Constitutional Court in Central Jakarta earlier on Wednesday.

"In every country you will find wrongdoings and violations of the election procedures, but what is very important is whether the control mechanism functions properly," he said.

However, the mission admitted to having heard allegations that vote buying was rampant ahead of the presidential election, and would verify the reports.

"We found very often the allegation was there but when we asked for witnesses, they tended to disappear. We are hoping to work with the domestic observers, because we are certainly aware of the allegations," Ford said.

Lehner added: "(The control bodies) should train witnesses better to collect hard evidence because we found there were so many allegations."

Asked about the European Union's interest in the election here, Ford said, "It is quite cheaper for everybody concerned to actually help a country stabilize and institute democracy rather than the consequence of having an undemocratic regime."