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As court deliberates, doubts on Prabowo's claims of vote fraud
Jakarta Globe - August 6, 2014
"Volunteers, sympathizers and politicians from our coalition members will stage a moral movement. God willing, around 30,000 to 50,000 of them will be present at MK [the Constitutional Court]," Andre Rosaide, a member of the campaign team of Prabowo and his vice presidential candidate Hatta Rajasa, said in Jakarta on Tuesday.
Another team member, M. Taufik, said the crowd would be there to "guard" the first hearing of the case. He added that other supporters would also stage protests at the headquarters of the National Police, the Election Organizers Ethics Council (DKPP) and the General Elections Commission (KPU) at separate locations in Jakarta. Police said they would dispatch at least 800 officers to secure the court.
The legal team of the losing pair filed a lawsuit at the court last month, challenging the official election result announced by the KPU on July 22 – which put Joko and his vice presidential candidate Jusuf Kalla in the lead with almost 71 million votes, or 53.15 percent of the total, over Prabowo-Hatta's 46.85 percent.
In the legal challenge filed on July 25, the Prabowo's camp claimed that they should be the winner of the election with 50.25 percent votes over Joko-Kalla's 49.74 percent.
In the first revision dated July 26, the Prabowo-Hatta legal team added that as many as 24.1 million "troubled" votes from more than 55,000 polling stations were responsible for "structured, systematic and massive" cheating that they alleged KPU officials of having committed – in favor of Joko-Kalla.
Last week, the team further raised the "troubled" voting figure to 50 million votes from 210,000 poll stations – although they still maintain that the final result should match their version: 50.25 percent vs 49.74 percent, in favor of Prabowo-Hatta.
Almost 479,000 polling stations were scattered across the country – with the voter turnout during the July 9 election reaching 133.5 million, representing 70.2 percent of Indonesia's eligible voters. The original document and the first revision were available on the court's website.
The Prabowo-Hatta team said the number of the "troubled" votes "is way much bigger" than the difference in votes between the two candidates, which according to the official KPU tally totaled 8.4 million votes.
The significant number of troubled votes "will thus very much influence the tally declared by the defendant [the KPU], and may reverse the vote gain," according to the first revision.
The team defines "troubled" votes as those including the unmatched number of voters and used ballots recorded at poll stations, the unmatched number of total ballots that include a mix of valid and invalid ballots, and the large number of people who cast their votes after showing only their identity cards.
The team also alleges that violations were not only committed by the KPU, but also by the campaign team of Joko-Kalla. Those violations include mobilizing people outside the original voters list (DPT) to cast their votes across Indonesia; "money politics"; recast of ballots by the same persons and the "massive" casting of votes by polling station officers.
'Confusing'
Hadar Gumay, a commissioner at the KPU, said last week, though, that the KPU was having difficulties in reviewing the lawsuit because many of the allegations were "confusing."
"We're confused. Some regions were mentioned [in the list of provinces as having 'troubled' votes], but it's not clear what the problems are," Hadar was quoted as saying by Detik.com.
"We've checked their attachment [to the list], but it appears to only contain the list of evidence, not copies of the evidence themselves. So we end up guessing. We must guess extra hard," he added.
A number of inconsistencies in the 146-page first revision document do exist. For example, Prabowo-Hatta's version of the final tally, at 50.25 percent to 49.74 percent, don't add up to 100 percent, only 99.99 percent.
At one point, the Prabowo-Hatta team says that "structured, systematic and massive" violations took place in "nearly all provinces," but then say that those were committed across "entire provinces."
In the breakdown by province, there is no explanation for some provinces mentioned in the list of where the alleged violations took place and how – as in the case of Riau Islands, Maluku and all provinces in Kalimantan.
Throughout the list the "structured, systematic and massive" cheating allegations are repeatedly mentioned, but facts offered in the explanation don't describe in full allegations of massive cheating.
In Aceh, for example, the team suggested a difference of only 637 votes between the total number of voters and the total number of ballots used across 246 poll stations. There were 2 million valid votes cast in Aceh.
In North Maluku, the team alleges a local office of the KPU reported the turnout of two polling stations in a village. But in reality, nobody came to the polling stations. The team provided evidence in the document that Prabowo-Hatta had one at those two stations, with 752 votes to 263 votes for Joko-Kalla.
Ultimately, the number of allegedly troubled votes the team mentioned in the document totaled only around 2.1 million votes, which would not be enough to match the difference of 8 million votes in the KPU's official tally.
As for other allegations of discrepancies, in Papua and West Papua, the team has protested the use of the traditional "noken" system, which means that tribal heads are allowed to vote on behalf of their people.
The Constitutional Court ruled in favor of this voting method in 2009, as difficult terrain and underdeveloped infrastructure in the two provinces made it difficult for tribal people living in mountainous areas or in the depth of the jungles to visit polling stations to cast their votes.
The Prabowo-Hatta team has accused Joko-Kalla of benefiting illegally from the system. The Joko-Kalla pair did win in the two provinces, 72 percent of the votes in Papua and 68 percent in West Papua.
"[Papua and West Papua] are a wrong target. Noken has been recognized by the state, with a 2009 verdict of the MK," political observer Boni Hargens said of the noken clause during a discussion in Jakarta on Tuesday, as quoted by metrotvnews.com. "If they want to dispute [the tally], dispute it on clauses other than noken."
Ray Rangkuti, of the Indonesian Civil Circle (LIMA), said if the Prabowo-Hatta team did manage to bring in "10 trucks of evidence" as they have previously claimed to support their accusations, the team would be able to meet the administrative requirements before the court agrees to proceed with the case.
"The Prabowo team wouldn't likely have difficulties to meet [the administrative requirements]. At least, as they've often claimed, they have prepared a dozen trucks carrying evidence of [alleged] cheating," Ray said on Tuesday.
He said Prabowo's declaration of rejecting the "legally flawed" official KPU result on the same day of the announcement on July 22, might serve as an obstacle for his legal team, which said to be composed of 95 lawyers. The KPU, in comparison, said they have hired 16 attorneys to represent them.
"Basically, if Prabowo rejects the presidential election, then all his rights concerning the election will be omitted, including the right to dispute the result at MK," Ray said. "This issue will surely trigger heated debates in the MK's hearing room. There will be a lot of legal arguments."
'Independent' court
Hamdan Zoelva, the chief justice of the Constitutional Court, on Tuesday assured the "independence" of the nine-justice court. He disclosed his background as a former politician with the Crescent Star Party (PBB) – one of the seven parties in the Prabowo-Hatta coalition – as a matter of transparency. Hamdan is known to be a politician with the party from 1998 to 2010, serving as deputy chairman from 2005 to 2010.
"Before I entered the Constitutional Court, I've removed all my ties with any organization, including political parties," Hamdan said, defending his impartial stance.
Still, Hamdan's admission of impartiality has not only been doubted by some Joko-Kalla supporters. Messages circulating among some supporters of the Prabowo-Hatta team say he's a brother-in-law of Siti Musdah Mulia, a member of the Joko-Kalla campaign team, and will probably rule in favor of Joko. Hamdan hasn't responded to this issue.
"Believe us. We will only decide based on evidence gathered during trial. There is nobody – be it the state institutions, mass organizations or protesters and media – that can pressure the court's justices with regard to their stances and opinions," he said. The court is expected on Aug. 22 to make a decision, which would make the result final.
Hamdan further called on supporters of both tickets to avoid gathering at the court building, saying that it might cause unwanted pressures on the justices. "I suggest that they let the teams of attorneys of all parties involved to handle the case here. There's no need to dispatch your people to pressure us," Hamdan said.
Source: http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/news/court-deliberates-doubts-prabowos-claims-vote-fraud/.
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