More than half of ballot papers printed so far
More than half of ballot papers printed so far
M. Taufiqurrahman, Jakarta
The logistical woes that afflicted the legislative elections seem
unlikely to affect the July 5 presidential polls as three weeks
before polling day the firms appointed by the General Elections
Commission (KPU) have managed to print and to distribute a large
percentage of the ballot papers.
Data from the KPU made available to The Jakarta Post on Friday
showed that nine of the 18 firms contracted to print the ballot
papers had completed the printing of 74.3 million papers or
almost 50 percent of the total.
Distribution companies appointed by the KPU are delivering the
papers to the country's provinces, with far-flung regions
receiving priority.
KPU member Mulyana W. Kusumah said that the first batches of
papers had now reached 28 of the country's 32 provinces. "Some
have already even arrived at the regency level," he told
reporters here.
Mulyana said that ballot paper distribution would be unlikely
to face serious problems, and he was optimistic that the
commission could beat the June 25 deadline for the necessary full
consignments of ballot papers to have arrived in all 440
regencies.
"I expect that the printing of all ballot papers will have
been completed by June 15 and their distribution to have been
wrapped up by June 20," he said.
The commission has appointed 19 firms to print over 160
million ballot papers bearing the pictures of all the
presidential and vice presidential candidates.
Recently, the KPU appointed three more firms to print the
ballot papers besides the 15 firms that had already been awarded
contracts. The new firms are PT Intermasa, PT Induk Sarana and CV
Rizky Grafis.
They have been given contracts to print a total of 17,753,503
papers.
Official printing began on May 28 and each of the printers was
given 10 days to complete the work, including packaging.
The commission has registered a total of 153,357,307 million
eligible voters for the presidential election, up from the
147,106 million registered for the legislative elections.
The House of Representatives (DPR) has approved only Rp 3
trillion of the Rp 3.9 trillion election budget proposed by the
KPU. In addition, a substantial amount was spent on the
legislative elections, with the result that the commission says
it will now need additional funding of Rp 410 billion for the
presidential election.
Mulyana said in order cope with the funding shortage, election
commissions at all levels had been ordered to reduce their
expenditure.
"The presidential election will be much simpler than the
legislative elections. Therefore, it will be possible to trim
back unnecessary expenses," he said.