No grounds for querying poll results: PPI chairman

No grounds for querying poll results: PPI chairman

JAKARTA (JP): National Elections Committee (PPI) chairman
Jacob Tobing said on Monday there should not be any objection to
the June 7 election results because all tabulated votes, which
have reached the committee's computation center, had been
validated by the lower election committees.

"All tabulated poll results keyed into the National Elections
Committee would have been cleared of all fraudulent charges," he
told reporters at the PPI secretariat in South Jakarta.

"In principle, we (PPI) will only receive tabulated poll
results from the provincial election committees (PPD I) after all
the complaints of election fraud and irregularities have been
settled at the local level."

"Similarly, all poll results tabulated at the regency-level
election committees would have been cleared of such charges
before they were sent to the provincial election committees," he
said.

All violations have been reported by the official Election
Supervisory Committee to the Supreme Court, which will take
further action.

The PPI completed and announced on Monday the final results of
the vote count in 21 provinces and 108 overseas polling places.
The Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan) is
still leading with 131 House of Representatives (DPR) seats,
Golkar and the National Awakening Party (PKB) following with 85
and 40 seats respectively. The United Development Party (PPP) has
gained 37 seats and the National Mandate Party (PAN) 24.

While votes are still uncounted in the provinces of Bengkulu,
West Sumatra, West Kalimantan and North, Central and Southeast
Sulawesi, Jacob said the PPI would need additional days for
verification before it could officially announce the poll
results.

"We have secured the General Elections Commission's (KPU)
approval to announce the poll results on July 21," he said.

PPI deputy chairman Hasballah M. Saad said, however, that
there were still cases of alleged poll irregularities which
needed further clarification.

"Three provincial election committees -- Lampung, Bali and
Maluku -- still have to verify the excess number of votes
counted, in which the number of votes were greater than the
number of registered voters," he said.

He said there were 156,000 extra votes found in Lampung,
160,000 in Bali and 45,049 in Maluku.

"We're now waiting for replies from the three provincial
election committees about the extra votes," he said. "If they
cannot provide evidence that there were written receipts of
additional ballot votes sent by the KPU, the poll results at the
three provinces will be declared invalid."

Hasballah added that alleged use of falsified ballots were
found in Sibolga regency, North Sumatra, Pasaman regency in West
Sumatra and Donggala regency in Central Sulawesi.

Equal degree

Hasballah said alleged fraud mostly occurred during the
organization of the polls, in which some ballots were discovered
missing or in which official poll documents were incomplete.

"Almost all of the election participants, in varying degrees,
violated the electoral laws and regulations," he said.

"Meanwhile, PDI Perjuangan more or less committed the same
violations as Golkar," he added.

In a related development, KPU chairman Rudini said the
commission would meet Minister of Home Affairs Syarwan Hamid
regarding a debate on the validation of poll results.

A decree on guidelines on the poll stipulates that the
Elections Supervisory Committee (Panwaslu) can validate the final
poll results after it verifies all complaints of election fraud
and irregularities. Panwaslu's conclusion will be a binding and
final decision.

Some minor parties on the commission have said they might not
sign official results if violations of the polling and vote
counting were not settled.

They cited the 1999 electoral law, saying the General
Elections Commission is responsible for deciding the final
results of the polls, and protested the government decree, saying
it limited the KPU's authority over the poll results.

The law rules that the poll results are valid if two-thirds of
the KPU members approve them.(imn)