Former Indonesian president Abdurrahman Wahid has alleged fraud in the computerided tally of election results and said 16 parties would meet to discuss whether to accept the outcome of Monday's poll.
"There is widespread fraud," he said in an interview on local radio, citing the vote count and "various other" problems. "It's still a question whether the results of this election can be accepted," he said.
Local newspapers on Thursday also reported concerns about possible fraud in the computerised tally.
Latest results Thursday showed President Megawati Sukarnoputri's Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) virtually tied with the Golkar party which backed former dictator Suharto.
With more than 32 million votes tallied, PDI-P had 20.71 percent of the vote compared with 20.08 percent for Golkar, with Wahid's National Awakening Party in third place with 13.71 percent.
More than 147 million Indonesians were registered to vote.
Wahid said 16 of the 24 parties, including PDI-P, would meet late Thursday afternoon to discuss the "rules of play" so that the results can be accepted.
He said his concerns are not related to his own party's place. "This is connected to the upholding of democracy in Indonesia," said Wahid, who was dismissed as president and replaced by Megawati during a parliamentary vote in July 2001.
Republika daily said Megawati's PDI-P suddenly jumped ahead of Golkar in the tally as she made a brief visit to the national tabulation centre in a luxury Jakarta hotel on Wednesday.
The newspaper featured an interview with Roy Suryo, an information technology expert, who said the online tally system was not fraud-proof.
Another daily, Media Indonesia, reported that the Election Supervisory Committee has said manipulation may take place while data is processed at the national tabulation center, where the process cannot be monitored by witnesses.
The Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) alleged counting has been unfair and has cost it an estimated five percent of the vote.
"It occurred in many polling stations across the country and we are continuing to list it," campaign manager Muhammad Razikun was quoted by the Jakarta Post as saying after presenting evidence to the election supervisory committee. PKS has made a surprisingly strong showing with about seven percent of the vote.
The Independent Committee for Elections Monitors gave the supervisory committee a list of 191 alleged violations. These included voting outside polling stations, poll workers intentionally damaging ballots during counting, repeated voting and vote count manipulation.