No more changes to legislative list: PPI

JAKARTA (JP): The National Elections Committee (PPI) confirmed on Tuesday the list of provincial legislative candidates was final, shrugging off complaints lodged by parties contesting the June polls.

"There will be no revision to the list. It's final," PPI chairman Jacob Tobing said. "Parties had already been given a chance to recheck and file protests until Thursday night."

After a two-day delay, PPI announced on Friday the final list of 11,583 legislative candidates, reduced from about 13,500 names on the original list to run for the House of Representative (DPR) seats.

A total of 2,064 candidates missed the cut. Golkar Party, for instance, saw 919 of its registrants reduced to 856 and the Republic Party had the most dropped, down to 412 from its original list of 865 names.

Most of the missing names failed to complete required documents or were dropped by their respective parties following objections from their constituents.

Golkar has filed a complaint over the cut, citing malfeasance in the process of listing the legislative hopefuls.

Jacob said the PPI would heed all reports and complaints, but insisted the deadline for party supporters and the public to scrutinize the nominees had passed.

"If we keep revising the list, we will disrupt the whole poll process," Jacob said.

The committee has also dropped a number of legislative hopefuls who turned out to be listed in more than one party, according to Jacob.

"We will reprimand related parties and have the names removed from the list. Such an action has been unanimously endorsed in a PPI plenary meeting," Jacob said.

Various reports of multiple nominations have been submitted to PPI. Citing an example, a public complaint was raised against Fahrie Doemas of People's Choice Party (Pilar).

Fahrie, representing the party branch in Banjar district, South Kalimantan, was also registered as a Republican Party candidate in the same region. According to the report, Fahrie is a Pilar executive in the province.

Another Pilar candidate, who is based in Jayapura, Irian Jaya, Marata S. Pasaribu, was also claimed by Republican Party's East Lombok branch.

Jacob's colleague, Djuhad Mahja, said all reports concerning the legislative candidacy would be forwarded to the General Elections Commission (KPU).

Djuhad, who represents the United Development Party (PPP), said certain parties had tried to insert new legislative hopefuls to the final list.

"This is because there are frictions within parties. These small groups were discontent with the candidates," he said. But he refused to identify the parties.

Separately in Bengkulu, the provincial elections committee here received 12 objections to the provincial legislative nominees.

"Some reports said that the candidates were immoral or not recognized as local figures," Ansyori Ishak, chairman of Bengkulu's election committee, told Antara.

It was also reported that a legislative candidate was accused of cheating on his wife and involved in love affairs, he said.

In Surabaya, the capital of East Java, more than 100 legislative candidates out of the total 1,762 names refused to declare their wealth, which is one of the requirements to run for the House seats.

Chairman of provincial elections supervisory committee, Imam Soekarno, said he would bring the case to the local elections committee.

There were no clear reasons why the candidates were reluctant to abide by the rules, the news agency said.

Imam said the committee also found an age cheating case.

"We found a copy of an identity card full of corrections. It is likely that the candidate was under the minimum age of 21 years old," he said. (edt)