Red-eyed ballot counters work past deadlines

JAKARTA (JP): Thursday was the deadline for ballot counting results at every district polling committee (PPK) but in a number of districts the counting process was still far from finished.

According to the official schedule set by the General Elections Commission (KPU), ballot counting at PPK level should have finished on Thursday. June 14 is the deadline for the counting process at mayoralty level. Final results for city should be completed by June 17 before reaching the National Election Committee by June 21. Provisional results have been expected much earlier, raising concerns particularly among political parties, the public and observers.

The process was not yet completed even at subdistrict polling committees such as the Kebon Sirih subdistrict committee in Central Jakarta.

Fatigue was obvious among faces of members of the Tanah Abang district committee in Central Jakarta, who were rechecking ballot results of seven subdistricts. Rechecking is done by reading out loud the counting sheets of every subdistrict then having them recounted by all committee members. Members represent all parties registered in the district plus government representatives.

The committee members, along with security guards, guard ballot boxes around the clock against possibilities of vote- rigging.

"That's why errors could not be hindered, and the columns on the counting sheets are so small that sometimes we fill the column with wrong data," said Zuardi, a red-eyed committee member.

"In the case of such mistakes, we should recheck or even repeat the counting," he said. Zuardi said that after more than two hours, committee members had only completed rechecking results from two of the seven subdistricts.

If reports from the subdistricts were complete, the earliest the Tanah Abang district committee would have completed its job would have been late Thursday.

When asked whether they could meet the deadline, another committee member, Suherman, just smiled.

"I am not sure because data from Kebon Melati subdistrict has not been sent," he told The Jakarta Post during a break. The recounting process was witnessed by members of poll observers and several parties' cadres in line with the rule. Difficulties were raised when members of the committee were missing.

The district committee also rechecks the number of invalid ballots at all subdistrict committees.

The counting sheet of the district committee is then sent to the Mayoralty Election Committees along with the ballot boxes, ballot papers and other poll equipment.

Suherman was surprised upon knowing that the city administration had preliminary results based on the data of each district, which was said to be for "internal purposes" of the administration.

Efforts of at least one subdistrict committee was rejected by the district committee. Muchlis, a member of the Kebon Sirih subdistrict, was sent back by the Menteng district committee because there were too many erase marks and crosses on the counting sheet. Muchlis had to request another sheet from the Central Jakarta Mayoralty Elections Committee, but sheets there ran out so another member was sent to get one from the Provincial Election Committee.

Meanwhile at the Joint Operations Media Center (JOMC), helping to issue reliable though unofficial results of the General Elections Commission, a 150-strong workforce of mostly university students were seen on Thursday morning working 150 telephone lines and jotting down the latest election results.

On the first floor of the Hotel Aryaduta Jakarta the workers immediately handed filled in forms to helpers manning the center's computer network system and into which information was fed through 100 computers.

Each form has a pin code written on the right-hand side by the helper who takes the call. The code indicates the province from which the information came from.

JOMC operational director Ross Mackay added Thursday that data was being faxed or phoned in by about 75 percent of the 4,000 district polling committees (PPK) nationwide.

The remaining 25 percent which did not have phone lines, relayed the information via radio to offices of the regional elections committees (PPD II), who then phoned or faxed the data to JOMC, he said.

The 400 helpers who work three shifts daily keep the world updated with reliable, but unofficial election results, with technical help from 20 members of the Australian General Elections Commission and the International Foundation for Election Systems (IFES) of the US, Mackay said.

He stressed JOMC was right on schedule, in terms of providing "early and indicative" results of the June 7 election.

"The General Elections Commission (KPU) here gave us till June 10 to provide early, indicative results," Mackay said.

As of 12:14 p.m. on June 10, at least 11 percent of the votes cast by approximately 100 million people on June 7 were tallied.

On the perceived slow process of counting Mackay said, subdistrict election offices had to gather forms from 320,000 polling stations -- each form representing the voice of some 400 voters -- and verify the forms before submitting results to district election committees.

"The JOMC instead receives information already worked on by the 4,000 district election committees... each form we receive, represents some 30,000 voters". (ind/ylt)