The Petitioner’s witness Tera Irawan conveying a statement on the 2024 legislative election results dispute for Riau Province, Tuesday (5/28/2024) on panel 1. Photo by MKRI/Ifa.

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JAKARTA (MKRI) — The National Mandate Party (PAN) presented several witnesses at a follow-up hearing on the 2024 House of Representatives (DPR), Provincial and Regency/City Regional Legislative Council (DPRD) election results dispute (PHPU) for Riau Province on Tuesday, May 28, 2024 in the plenary courtroom. PAN is registered as the Petitioner of case No. 61-01-12-04/PHPU.DPR-DPRD-XXII/2024.

At the hearing chaired by Chief Justice Suhartoyo, PAN’s witness Tera Irawan revealed significant special voters having been discovered at the recapitulation in Muarajaya Village, Kepenuhan Hulu Subdistrict. “It exceeded 2% at TPS (polling stations) 1 through 13 and 15,” Tera said.

He found out about this after seeing the C-result form on the first sheet. He then conveyed an objection and reported to the Rokan Hulu Regency Bawaslu (Elections Supervisory Body). According to him, Bawaslu’s response could not be followed up by the Rokan Hulu Bawaslu. “The Rokan Hulu Bawaslu reasoned that there was no violation of code of ethics by the election organizers,” he said.

The same thing was revealed by another PAN witness, Muhammad Zen. He said that he had attended the meeting in person and had made a note of special incidents at the PPK (subdistrict election committee) and asked for the signature of the head of Kepenuhan Hulu subdistrict election committee, who did not sign it.

No Issues

At the hearing, the General Elections Commission (KPU) as Respondent also presented witness Ridwan Sofi, the head of polling station working committee (KPPS) of TPS 10 of Muarajaya Village. He explained that starting from the voting process for final voters, there were no problems whatsoever.

“Regarding the excess 2%, our special voters are indeed 22 in number and exceeded [2%],” he said.

Next, Zulkarnain, head of Kepenuhan Hulu Subdistrict subdistrict election committee (PPK), emphasized that the Petitioner’s argument that the PPK did not send invitations to the plenary committee meeting was not true. According to him, he had sent a recapitulation invitation to all stakeholders and the Petitioner (PAN) before the recapitulation process was carried out.

Another witness for the Respondent, chief commissioner of the Rokan Hulu Regency KPU Cepi Abdul Husen, explained that there were indeed witness objections and these objections had been responded to and Bawaslu’s opinions had been asked for. However, Bawaslu left the results to the chairman of the recapitulation meeting and stated that it could not follow up on the witnesses’ objections. “The witness objections were not related to recapitulation errors and procedure,” he said.

Also read:

KPU Allegedly Used Special Voters List Illegally at 15 Muara Jaya TPS

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No Objections

Subadi, presented as the Relevant Party’s witness by the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), emphasized that there were no objections/special incidents from the witnesses. He said the voting had gone smoothly until it was over.

Responding to the witnesses’ testimonies, Bumber Siregar said on behalf of Bawaslu that supervision of the polling stations showed there were no problems and objection forms from witnesses at 15 polling stations in Muarajaya Village.

“Then intersecting with the recapitulation was the Petitioner’s report to Bawaslu regarding the irregularities in the number of special voters. From the results of monitoring and review, there was no regulation or provision that limits special voters to only 2%, so at TPS 1 the final voters were 294. The reserve ballots should be 2% or 7,” he explained.

Previously, the Petitioner argued that the Respondent had used over 2% of reserve ballots for special voters. In addition, it wanted a revote at 15 polling stations in Muara Jaya Village, Kepenuhan Hulu Subdistrict.

Author              : Utami Argawati
Editor                : Lulu Anjarsari P.
PR                    : Fauzan Febriyan
Translator         : Jessica Rivena Meilania/Yuniar W.

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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