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Wednesday, February 17, 2021 | 17:32 WIB

The online ruling hearing of the West Halmahera Regency election results dispute, Wednesday (17/2/2021) in the Courtroom of the Constitutional Court. Photo by Humas MK/Ifa.

JAKARTA, Public Relations of the Constitutional Court—The Constitutional Court (MK) rendered the 2020 West Halmahera mayor election results dispute petition by Candidate Pair No. 2 Dany Missy-Imran Lolory inadmissible. The Decision No. 108/PHP.GUB-XIX/2021 was read out by Chief Justice Anwar Usman at a ruling hearing on Wednesday, February 17, 2021 in the plenary courtroom.

In the legal considerations read out by Constitutional Justice Wahiduddin Adams, the Court stated that it didn’t find any violation or manipulation that the Petitioner alleged that affected the vote acquisition in the election. The Petitioner’s witnesses signed the KWK-result C model form and the KWK-copy C model form and didn’t raise any objection at the polling stations (TPS). In addition, the Respondent had followed up on the regency Bawaslu’s (Elections Supervisory Body) recommendation of a revote at TPS 02 of Moiso Village, South Jailolo Subdistrict.

“Based on the aforementioned legal considerations, the Court believes that the a quo petition doesn’t warrant any violation of Article 158 of Law No. 1 of 2016 regarding the Petitioner’s legal standing, which is a formal requirement to file a governor, regent, and mayor election results dispute petition to the Court. Therefore, it is [inappropriate] to advance the a quo petition to the evidentiary hearings,” Justice Wahiduddin Adams read.

The Court believes the Petitioner didn’t have legal standing because the vote margin between the Petitioner and the candidate pair with the most votes exceeded the 2% threshold out of the total valid votes, following Article 158 paragraph (2) letter a of Law No. 10 of 2016, which is 2% of 66,589 votes, or 1,332 votes.

“The Petitioner earned 21,074 votes while the Relevant Party (candidate pair with the most votes) earned 22,524 votes, so the vote margin between them was 21,074 subtracted from 22,524, which is 1,450 votes (2.18%) or more than 1,332 votes,” Justice Wahiduddin stressed.

Also read:

West, South, North Halmahera Regency Election Results Challenged

West Halmahera KPU Refutes All of Petitioner's Allegations

At the preliminary hearing on Thursday, January 28, 2021, the Petitioner alleged the high vote margin between the Petitioner and the Relevant Party was due to structured, systematic, and massive (TSM) violations and manipulation by the election organizer at polling stations (TPS) in seven sub-districts: West Halmahera, Jailolo, South Jailolo, Ibu, North Ibu, South Ibu, Sahu, and Loloda. They also alleged that the Relevant Party’s campaign team had mobilized voters who were unlisted in the DPT (final voters list) while the regency’s General Elections Commission (KPU) ignored those unlisted voters to vote at TPS whose voters were recorded in the additional final voters list (DPTb). 

Phantom voters were allegedly inputted in the DPTb, and the DPTb attendance list was replaced by a blank paper. This goes against the KPU regulation for not following the voting procedure, where the attendance list to use should be one the KPU prepares. The violations and manipulation were a way to use these phantom voters for the Relevant Party’s win. Therefore, in the petitum, the Petitioner appealed to the Court to annul the West Halmahera Regency KPU Decree dated December 17, 2020 on the Certification of the 2020 West Halmahera Regency Election Vote Counting Recapitulation and order a revote.

Writer: Utami Argawati
Editor: Lulu Anjarsari
Uploader: Fuad Subhan

Translator: Yuniar Widiastuti
Editor: R.A. Indah Apriyanti
Managing Editor: Budi Wijayanto

Translation uploaded on 02/18/2021 13:30 WIB

Disclaimer: The original version of the news is in Indonesian. In case of any differences between the English and the Indonesian version, the Indonesian version will prevail.

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