Official poll body checks registration

JAKARTA (JP): The official Election Supervision Committee, led by its chief, Attorney General Singgih, yesterday conducted monitoring of the voter registration procedures.

The team watched registration activities in some districts of South and West Jakarta as well as in Tangerang, some 30 kilometers west of Jakarta. The national registration drive began on Wednesday and will last until May 20.

Included in the team were Lt. Gen. Syarwan Hamid and Commodore Pranowo of the Armed Forces, as well as representatives of the three political organizations competing in the 1997 general elections.

They included Abdul Gafur of the ruling Golkar faction, Tosari Widjaja of the United Development Party (PPP), and Ismunandar of the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI).

At almost the same time, a number of independent poll watchdogs also began their supervision of the registration procedure.

Effendi Saman and Desmond J. Mahesa of the National Committee for the Supervision of General Elections in Bandung, and Santoso of the Independent Election Monitoring Committee in Jakarta said their organizations had sent activists across the country forms to note down violations, their perpetrators and people who report violations to them.

"We'll then conduct investigations," Effendi said.

Back in Jakarta, Chief of the Setiabudi sub-district Sujadi H.M. Ali in South Jakarta told Singgih and his team that in only two days, the registration officers had registered 6,406 people or half of those eligible to vote in his area.

Registration officers began knocking on doors to register all Indonesians 17 years of age or older, and teenagers who are already married, as voters in the 1997 general election, which is scheduled for June next year.

Under the Indonesian electoral system voters will choose their representatives for local government and the national legislature. (imn/17)