PDI joins campaign against election fraud

PDI joins campaign against election fraud

JAKARTA (JP): The Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI) joined the
United Development Party (PPP) yesterday in calling for changes
in the electoral rules to ensure a clean general election in
1997.

PDI chairperson Megawati Soekarnoputri outlined the party's
demands in a speech to mark the party's 23rd anniversary in
Ambon, Maluku last night.

The government should do away with the "silent week" period
normally set after the end of the month-long election campaign
and before polling day, Megawati said as quoted by Antara.

The seven-day period is intended to cool off the situation
after the normally tense, and sometimes violent, campaigns.

"Past experiences showed that many violations occurred during
this silent week. Some people were intimidated and they became
too restless to be able to vote according to their conscience,"
she was quoted as saying.

She did not specify who committed these violations or
intimidations, but it is widely understood that she was referring
to Golkar, the dominant political group which has won every
single election held under President Soeharto's rule since 1971.

Megawati called on the Armed Forces and the Civil Service to
maintain neutrality during the elections. "They too have to
uphold and enforce the law, and punish violations irrespective of
who commit them," she said.

PPP chairman Ismail Hasan Metareum in a hard hitting speech
last week also announced his party's intention to seek changes in
the law on election, to prevent cheating and ensure that
violations do not go unpunished as they have in the past.

Both PPP and PDI are also insisting that polling day be
declared a national holiday to allow people to cast their vote at
polling booths closer to home, instead of at their offices, where
they face possible intimidation by their employers.

While it may be too late to change the law on election in time
for the 1997 polls, the two minority parties could, theoretically
at least, insist on changes in the electoral regulations. Both
minority parties have become more vocal about the cheating
allegedly committed by Golkar in past elections.

PDI is a coalition of five nationalist and Christian parties
which were merged as the government sought to pare the number of
political parties contesting the election down to three.

The party's public standing was boosted in 1993 with the
election of Megawati Soekarnoputri, the daughter of Indonesia's
first president, the late Sukarno. Megawati was swept into the
post by party supporters in defiance of government pressures.

Megawati, however, is not without her share of problems and a
number of senior party leaders, with the tacit support of some
government officials, have continued to flaunt her leadership by
forming rival boards in the provinces.

In East Java, PDI's participation in the provincial election
committee may be forfeited unless it resolves the conflict over
the chapter's leadership, which has been fiercely fought between
one camp who supports Megawati and one who opposes her
leadership.

Minister of Home Affairs Moch. Yogie S.M. has given PDI until
the end of the month to resolve the conflict in East Java.
(emb/imn)