PHPU of Tanjungbalai Municipality: Witnesses Still Talk About “Money Politics”
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The Petitioners in the petition of Case on Tanjung Balai Municipality Election Dispute.


Jakarta, MKOnline – The follow-up hearing for the examination of witnesses in the Tanjungbalai Pemilukada – Case No. 166/PHPU. D-VIII/2010 - was held by the Constitutional Court (MK) on Tuesday (21/9) in the The Constitutional Court (The Court) Plenary Session Room. In the hearing, the statement of the Petitioners’ witness was directly denied by the witness of the Related Party. In addition, the Panwaslu of Tanjungbalai was not making a follow-up to 24 violations in during the implementation of Tanjungbalai Pemilukada.  

The Petitioners’ witness, Bagus Joko Triono, started the hearing by giving his statement around money politics. Bagus conveyed that on August 26, 2010 he met Eka Hadi Sucipto (Mayor Candidate with Candidacy No. 6) in the location of the Secretariat at the Arteri Centre. Based on the results of observation and analysis in a number of TPS, only a small number of people came to the TPS

“Then Mr. Eka told me and 6 staff of mine to contact all sub-district and TPS coordinators to conduct mass mobilization, visit voters’ homes, so that they would vote for Candidate Pair No. 6 (Eka Hadi Sucipto, S.E. and Afrizal Zulkarnain, S.Ag) and they were promised money in the amount of 50.000 Rupiah each,” told Bagus who became a consultant for the side of Eka Hadi Sucipto.   

In the evening the next day, August 27, 2010, Bagus and his friend, Hamzah, were contacted by Eka Hadi Sucipto, asking them to come to the official house of the mayor. Thereafter, they were led to Hadi Husada Hospital. At that time, Eka Hadi Sucipto asked Bagus to contact sub-district coordinators who had cast their vote to come to the hospital. Thereafter, they would bring the voter’s card to be exchanged for money. 

“I directly saw the coordinators exchanging voter’s cards of the mass for money. The total number of some voter’s cards multiplied by 50,000 Rupiah reached 20 million Rupiah,” conveyed Bagus. 

In response to the statement of the Petitioners’ Witness named Bagus, Raslin as the Witness of the Related Party denied such money politics alleged to have been committed by the Mayor Candidate No. 6, who distributed money to sub-districts and TPS coordinators, who continued the distribution to the voting mass. 

“As I know it, Mr. Eka is a figure concerned with the community. Mr. Bagus just said that Mr. Eka had practiced money politics, but I say it is not true,” denied Raslin.  

Meanwhile, Panwaslu of Tanjungbalai conveyed to the Panel of Justices that they were in the process to follow-up the reports on violations during the implementation of Tanjungbalai Pemilukada. It was identified that there had been 24 cases of criminal violations during Pemilukada, which were being processed by the police. Subsequently, when the Panel of Justices asked about the existence of Arteri Centre, the Tanjungbalai Panwaslu was in fact unaware of the existence of such institution. 

The Panel of Justices chaired by Mahfud MD finally closed the hearing after considering the evidence and statements of the Witnesses sufficient. The next hearing would be for the agenda of decision pronouncement on September 28. (Nano Tresna A./mh)  


Wednesday, September 22, 2010 | 09:06 WIB 191