REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA -- The General Elections Commission (KPU) and the Elections Supervisory Agency (Bawaslu) must tightly supervise the implementation of the presidential elections, a corruption watchdog has said.
"The upcoming July 9 presidential elections must be supervised tightly by the KPU and the Bawaslu because the Constitutional Court (MK) has decreed that it should be held in one round only," Corruption Division Coordinator of Indonesia Corruption Watch (ICW), Abdullah Dahlan said here on Friday.
He said that the MK's ruling which suggested that the elections should be held in one round had the potential to create fraud because each of the contesting parties would apply all means and efforts to win the presidential race.
The ICW activist said the fraud potential could be reflected in the violations committed during last April 9 legislative elections, including votes manipulation.
"In the face of the upcoming July 9 presidential elections, the neutrality of the KPU and Bawaslu across the country is badly needed," he said.
He said that money politics was another form of native aspects on elections that should also receive attention. The pattern of money politics in the upcoming presidential elections will differ from that in last legislative election.
"Money politics operations in the April 9 legislative election was committed directly by legislative candidates while in the upcoming presidential elections, it would be conducted by a shadow team which is not officially registered," the ICW official said.
Because it is carried out by a shadow team it will be very difficult for the ICW to figure out indications of violation in next presidential elections.
"For this reason, a tight supervision should be done in the run-up to the D-Day of the election on July 9, 2014," Abdullah asserted.
The Constitutional Court here on Thursday decided that the Indonesian presidential election, due to be held on July 9, will be conducted in a single round.
The decision was made following the judicial review of article 159, point one, in Law Number 42/2008 on presidential and vice presidential election, Constitutional Court Chief Justice Hamdan Zoelva stated.
The Article 159, point one, is not legally binding to a condition that there are only two pairs of presidential and vice presidential candidates, Zoelva added.
The article noted that winning the presidential election would require the pair of presidential and vice presidential candidates to win more than 50 percent of the total votes, gaining 20 percent of the votes per province for the majority of the provinces in Indonesia.
The judicial review was filed by the Constitutional Lawyers Forum, Election and Democracy Forum, and two individuals, Sunggul Hamonangan and Haposan Situmorang.
The July 9 presidential election will be contested by the Prabowo Subianto-Hatta Rajasa pair and Joko Widodo-Jusuf Kalla duo.
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