Candidate Pair Number 2 Nasrudin Azis and Eti Herawati as Relevant Party being welcomed by the winning candidates after the ruling hearing in the 2018 Cirebon Mayoral Election Results Dispute (PHP), Wednesday (31/10) in the Plenary Courtroom of the Constitutional Court. Photo by Humas MK/Ganie.

The Constitutional Court (MK) rejected the petition for the 2018 Cirebon Mayoral Election Results Dispute (PHP) for all. "The verdict rejects the Petitioners\' petition in its entirety," said Chief Justice of the Constitutional Court Anwar Usman accompanied by the other constitutional justices in the Decision Number 8/PHP.KOT-XVI/2018 hearing on Wednesday (10/31). 

The Court obtained the legal information that on September 22, 2018 2018 Cirebon Mayoral Re-election (PSU) was held at 24 polling stations (TPS), that is, in TPS 15 Kesambi Village, TPS 15 Drajat Village, TPS 16 Drajat Village. Then in the Kejaksan Subdistrict that includes TPS 3, TPS 5, TPS 6, TPS 11, TPS 12, TPS 14, TPS 15, TPS 16, TPS 17, TPS 18, TPS 19, TPS 20, TPS 18, TPS 19, TPS 20, TPS 22, TPS 23, TPS 20 , TPS 25, TPS 27, and TPS 28 Kesenden Village. Also, in Lemahwungkuk Subdistrict that includes TPS 16 Kesepuhan Village and TPS 15 Panjunan Village. And then, in Pekalipan Subdistrict in TPS 10 Jagasatru Village. 

A report by the Respondent (Cirebon Municipal Election Commission) and the Cirebon Municipal Elections Supervisory Agency shows that Candidate Pair Number 1 Bamunas Setiawan Boediman and Effendi Edo received 2,943 votes, while Candidate Pair Number 2 Nasrudin Azis and Eti Herawati (Relevant Party) won 2,997 votes. The re-election results were then tallied up with the results in the first 2018 Cirebon Mayoral Election. The final results show that Candidate Pair Number 1 received 78.671 votes (49.40%) while Candidate Pair Number 2 received 80. 590 votes (50.60%).

"Considering this fact, the Court considered that the KPU and its staff and Bawaslu and their staff had implemented the Constitutional Court Decision No. 8 on September 12, 2018 and no new facts were found on violations, both in reports and the hearings. Therefore, that the votes obtained from the re-election are valid and will be published in this ruling," said Deputy Chief of the Constitutional Court Aswanto who read out the opinion of the Court. 

Furthermore, the Court responded to the Petitioners\' argument about the reduction of their votes and the addition to the Relevant Party\'s votes because there had been a discrepancy between the number of male and female voters and that of valid and invalid votes for the candidate pairs. The Relevant Party had affirmed that the Petitioners\' argument was incorrect and not founded on facts and reality in the field because the argument about the discrepancy had been corrected at the KPPS (Polling Station Working Committee), the PPS (polling committee), and PPK (District Election Committee) in the sub-districts. Therefore, the Court considered the Petitioners\' argument not proven and unreasonable according to law. 

Candidate Pair Bamunas Setiawan Boediman-Effendi Edo as Petitioners had challenged problematic opening of ballot boxes in most polling stations in all sub-districts in Cirebon. The pair then filed a petition to the Constitutional Court, who then passed an interlocutory injunction ordering a re-election. In the follow-up hearing on October 16, 2018, the Cirebon Municipal KPU Chairman of 2013-2018 Emirzal Hamdani delivered a report on the re-election and re-counting of the 2018 Cirebon Mayoral Election.

Meanwhile, the West Java Provincial KPU, represented by Endun Abdul Haq as the Commissioner, explained a number of activities carried out by the West Java Provincial KPU. For example, on September 20, 2018, they destroyed damaged ballots in the 2018 Cirebon mayor re-election. In addition, they held a technical coordination meeting for the 2018 Cirebon mayor re-election. 

Then, on September 21, 2018, the West Java Provincial KPU distributed the logistics for the 2018 Cirebon mayor re-election, including monitoring 24 polling stations throughout all villages and sub-districts in Cirebon. Furthermore, Muhammad Joharudin as representative of the Cirebon Muncipal Election Supervisory Agency (Bawaslu) said that in the implementation of the 2018 Cirebon Mayoral Re-election, the agency had coordinated with the police and the polling stations. (Nano Tresna Arfana/LA/Yuniar Widiastuti)