Amandus Situmorang from Bawaslu at a follow-up hearing on election results dispute for Papua legislatives to hear responses from the Respondent, Relevant Parties, and Bawaslu, also authorization of evidence of Relevant Parties, Wednesday (5/8/2024). Photo by MKRI/Teguh.

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JAKARTA MKRI – The General Elections Commission (KPU) revealed that there was a commotion during the plenary recapitulation at the South Jayapura District level at the Grand Abe Hotel on March 18, 2024. At that time, the Jayapura City KPU withdrew the South Jayapura District Election Committee (PPD) to immediately complete the district level recapitulation and participate in carrying out the plenary recapitulation at the city level.

"The results have not yet been obtained due to complaints from several political party witnesses participating in the plenary session at the South Jayapura District level which resulted a commotion in the room that finally continued until March 19, 2024," said the Respondent's (KPU) legal counsel, Rahman Ramli at the 2024 election results dispute (PHPU) case hearing.  The petition was filed by Sichard Elfriets Mual, a legislative candidate from the Indonesian Solidarity Party (PSI).

The hearing took place on Wednesday, May 8, 2024 on the Panel 2. The hearing for case No. 26-02-15-33/PHPU.DPR-DPRD-XXII/2024 was presided over by Deputy Chair Justice Saldi Isra and the Constitutional Justices Ridwan Mansyur dan Arsul Sani.

The Respondent continued, the plenary session at the South Jayapura District level will continue on March 19, 2024 and the recapitulation results in the Subdistrict D Results must be included in the Regency/City D Results. According to the Respondent, the Papua Province KPU can no longer accept objections due to time limit until the plenary session is completed on March 20, 2024. This is because the results of the city level recapitulation must be immediately read out at the provincial level recapitulation plenary.

The KPU said that the argument argued by Sichard was an internal PSI problem. The Petitioner's witnesses continued to be suddenly changed, there was a tug-of-war on assignment letters at the city and provincial levels, resulting in the general election committees having to stop the vote count recapitulation process and first remove one of the witnesses from the room.

However, of all the witnesses presented by the Petitioner, basically they did not raise any objections at the district level plenary to the Jayapura City level plenary. Thus, the KPU rejected the argument that Sichard's votes had been reduced by 103 votes. The KPU said that Sichard's correct vote acquisition was 878 votes.

The Elections Supervisory Body (Bawaslu) also stated that Sichard's vote acquisition was 878 votes based on the supervising results report and attachment model D Results of District/City DPRD for all subdistricts of South Jayapura District. Bawaslu Jayapura admitted that it had followed up on Sichard's report of alleged election violations, but Bawaslu did not explain this clearly during the hearing.

Meanwhile, no party has proposed to become a Relevant Party for this case. For information, in the petitum, the Petitioner requests the Court to annul KPU Decree No. 360 of 2024 on Certification of election results of DPR (House of Representatives), DPD (Regional Representatives Council), Provincial/Regency/City DPRD (Regional Legislative Council) nationally. The Petitioner also requests the Court to declare the Petitioner’s correct vote acquisition based on C1 Form namely Sichard Elfriets Mual, candidate number 2 from PSI.

Also read: Jayapura City DPRD Legislative Candidate from PSI Alleges Loss of Votes 

Author : Mimi Kartika.

Editor : Nur R.

Translator : Intana Selvira Fauzi

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

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