Poll rigging has begun, PPP chief claims

Poll rigging has begun, PPP chief claims

JAKARTA (JP): United Development Party (PPP) chief Ismail
Hasan Metareum said Wednesday he had evidence a government
official had begun fixing the May 29 poll results.

After a leadership meeting to review the first week of
campaigning, Ismail said his party was worried the general
election committee was involved in poll rigging.

Ismail said a subdistrict head in a Sumatra province had
arranged results. He refused to name the province.

Quoting a document, Ismail said Golkar was allotted 86.29
percent of the vote, the PPP 7.00 percent and the Indonesian
Democratic Party 6.71 percent.

"The subdistrict head admitted to fixing the poll result,"
Ismail said.

He said he had given the evidence to the minister of home
affairs, Moch. Yogie S.M.

He said that judging from PPP's large campaign turnouts, it
looked like the party would do better in this election than in
1992 because there was a correlation between campaign turnouts
and the percentage of the vote received.

In 1977 PPP got one million votes to Golkar's 980,000. PPP
had huge campaign turnouts that year.

The Moslem-oriented party is aiming for 96 seats in the House
of Representatives. It has 62 seats now.

Ismail criticized Golkar for mobilizing civil servants and
students to attend its campaigns.

"We have received reports from our branch offices that
government employees and school students have been mobilized to
attend every Golkar election campaign event," he said.

PPP's deputy secretary-general Mohammad Buang said that in
Riau, schools and government offices were deserted when Golkar
campaigned.

Buang said people who had business with the manpower and
religious affairs ministries' local offices were not looked after
because most employees were at campaign events.

Buang said elementary and high schools in Riau were also
closed early this week because teachers and students were asked
to attend Golkar rallies.

"We were really surprised that the government rejected the
idea of holding the general elections on a holiday. It is a shame
that government offices and schools are not working when Golkar
holds campaign events," he said.

Ismail said four PPP branches in Yogyakarta have been
instructed to continue campaigning after a week-long boycott
after an attack on two PPP offices on April 30.

Five PPP Jakarta chapter branches were also temporarily absent
from campaigning after choosing not to take part in last Friday's
campaign.

The city-wide boycott was a show of solidarity against the
police who refused to issue a campaign permit for the PPP's South
Jakarta chapter. (imn/aan)