Panca Nugraha, Jakarta/Mataram – Student groups have called on the government and the General Elections Commission (KPU) for more transparency over the real condition of their preparations for the upcoming legislative elections.

"Based on field reports and information from provincial student associations, there are still crucial problems... that make us doubtful about the organizing of the 2009 general elections," said M. Rodli Kaelani, chairman of the Indonesian Muslim Students' Movement (PMII) after a joint meeting of five students' groups popularly known as the Cipayung Group here on Monday.

He added the student associations were also concerned with non-technical and political issues, including high-level crimes in the distribution of invalid ballots, election violations and the risk of vote rigging and vote count manipulation.

Rodli said the election's success depended not only on the technical factor, but also on non-technical and political factors or the way the election was organized and conducted.

He warned the way the polls were being organized now would have an impact not only on the quality of the elections, but also on the number of potential conflicts brought before the Constitutional Court.

He said the five associations, comprising the PMII, the Indonesian Muslim Students' Association (HMI), the Indonesian Nationalist Students' Movement (GMNI), the Indonesian Christian Students' Movement (GMKI) and the Indonesian Catholic Students' Association (PMKRI) would closely monitor the elections to help improve the quality of the polls.

The student groups were responding to the alleged crimes during the East Java gubernatorial race and the findings by the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) of voter list markups in East Java regencies as well as in Bali, which have rocked the political establishment as the country prepares for the April 9 legislative elections.

The alleged voter list fraud was revealed by former East Java Police chief Insp. Gen. Herman S. Sumawiredja and twice-defeated gubernatorial candidate Khofifah Indar Parawansa, who were suspicious of high-level intervention in the polls as part of a nationwide scenario in the general elections.

Despite denials by the government, the KPU and the police, there were also indications of fraud found on several voter lists in two regencies, where a key revote in East Java was held on Jan. 25.

Indonesian Police Watch (IPW) questioned the recent move by the National Police to return the contentious voter list case to the provincial elections supervisory committee (Panwaslu), saying the police should continue with their investigation into the case. "The police's decision... will discourage other police officials in other provinces from conducting objective and thorough probes into similar cases," said IPW coordinator Netha S. Pane as quoted by Antara.

Netha also called on the House of Representatives to immediately summon National Police chief Gen. Bambang Hendarso to seek a satisfactory explanation over the case.