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The Constitutional Court (The Court) held the trial on the dispute over Langkat election result, Friday (9/1), at The Court s Building with Case Verification as the agenda. Case No. 66/PHPU.D-VI/2008 was pleaded by Candidate Pair for Langkat Regent and Vice, Drs. H. Asrin Naim and Drs. H. Legimun.S.,M.Pd. Langkat Election Commission became the Petitionee of this case.

The Petitioner troubled over the Decision of the Petitionee No.29/2008 dated December 24, 2008 about the Announcement of Recapitulation Result of Langkat Second Round Election 2008, also the Decision about the Announcement of Elected Candidate in Langkat Election 2008.

The objection was caused by the transcript of proceeding of the recapitulation which could only explain the number of the legal votes  409.565 and the illegal ones 6.089 without being able to explain the unused ballots. 

The Petitioner also considered that the Petitionee was filled with the importance of one side so that the Election was conducted unfairly, dishonestly, and full of misconducts which were in massive, structured, and organized way. The Petitionee s actions, according to the Petitioner, very much affected the votes for the candidate pairs in Langkat Second Round Election 2008.

”The Petitionee have let several voters who were predicted to give the votes to the Petitioner lose their rights due to their names not in the Voters List and not getting the invitation to vote in the vote centers,” explained the Legal Counsel of the Petitioner, Hermansyah Dulaimi.

The Petitioner also claimed that the Petitionee had made a violation by inserting 69.934 voters without clear identity and status of residence also without their citizenship numbers found almost in all electoral area in Langkat Regency. The Petitioner believed it occurred in 23 districts all over Langkat.

Based on those things, the Petitioner demanded The Court to announce illegal and not binding as well as annulling both Petitionee s Decrees. The election itself was won by candidate pair No. 1 (Ngogesa Sitepu dan Budiono).

The Petitioner also asked the Court to order as well as punish the Petitionee by anulling or improving the recapitulation result in Langkat Election 2008 and set the Petitioner, Candidate pair No. 4, Drs. H. Asrin Naim and Drs. H. Legimun S, M.Pd as the elected candidate with 170.965 votes; whereas candidate pair No. 1 (Ngogesa Sitepu and Budiono) got 239.102 votes reduced by 69.934 undeserved right because they did not have the Citizenship Number, thus they only got 169.188 votes.

Responding to the pleading, a member of the Justice Panel Board, Abdul Mukthie Fadjar advised the Petitioner not to put the sentence ”The Langkat Regent Election has been done unfairly, dishonestly and filled with misconducts which were massive, structured and organized”, because the meaning of the sentence would be cliché and it could be a libel. ”The sentence is indeed the same with the one found in the Decision of the East Java Election with wide interpretation,” pointed out Mukthie.

Besides that, Mukthie also advised the Petitioner, if they had put the number of voters without Citizenship Number, as many as 69.934 people, then in the next trial, the Petitioner had to be ready to prove by showing the ballots as many as the number mentioned. Besides that, A member of Justice Panel Board, Muhammad Alim, added that when the Petitioner and the Petitionee proposed their witnesses, they had to be accompanied by the copy of the witnesses ID cards and it had to be arranged according to the list of witnesses to be presented before the court.

Before closing the trial, Head of Justice Panel Board, Achmad Sodiki, informed that the next trial would be held on Friday (15/1), at 16.00 WIB (GMT+07.00). (Prana Patrayoga Adiputra)

Photo: Doc. of CCRI PR/Yoga Adiputra

Translated by Yogi Djatnika / CCRI

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