KPU needs Rp 800b for second-round election

KPU needs Rp 800b for second-round election

Moch. N. Kurniawan, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The General Elections Commission (KPU) will need Rp 800 billion
to organize the second stage of the presidential elections,
should this be necessary, KPU secretary-general Safder Yusacc
said Friday.

"We have calculated the 2004 budget, and so far we don't have
enough money for the second round of the presidential election,"
Safder Yusacc said on Friday.

A second round will be held in September should the first
round, scheduled to take place in July, fail to produce a clear
winner.

A total of 24 political parties have been declared eligible
for the legislative election in April 2004. Parties or coalitions
of parties garnering at least 3 percent of the 550 seats in the
House of Representatives or the votes of 5 percent of the around
140 million eligible voters will be allowed to run in the
country's first ever direct presidential election in July 2004.
In the second round, only those candidates who came first and
second in the first round will be allowed to run.

Safder said that had the House not cut the commission's budget
to Rp 3 trillion from Rp 3.9 trillion, the KPU would have had no
financial problems in organizing the second round of the
presidential election.

However, he also said that the KPU had doubled the allowances
for election officials working in the Village Election Committees
(PPS) and Polling Station Working Committees (KKPS) from Rp
40,000 to Rp 80,000 per person daily.

"That will cost us about Rp 200 billion," he said.

Previously, the KPU had planned to cancel the hike in
allowances for PPS and KPPS officials after the House decided in
late October to reduce the commission's 2004 budget.

There will be a total of 70,663 Village Election Committees
and 543,025 Polling Station Working Committees involved in next
year's elections.

Yusacc said that the KPU would discuss an increase in the
KPU's 2004 budget with officials from the Ministry of Finance on
Tuesday.

Separately, KPU member Anas Urbaningrum said KPU did not
require a legislative candidate to be explicitly declared free
from drugs by a doctor.

"It is the doctor's job to decide whether someone is a
drug addict ... we do not want to interfere with the medical
profession," he told reporters.

Based on a KPU instruction, one of the requirements for a
legislative candidate is that he obtain a certificate of good
health from a doctor in a recognized hospital.

The KPU deputy chairman further explained that the minimum
medical tests consisted of blood and heart tests.

If necessary, a doctor could recommend that a candidate
undergo a psychological examination, he added.

Anas, however, said he would be pleased if doctors also took
the initiative of conducting drug tests on candidates.