Adianto P. Simamora and Erwida Maulida, Jakarta – Regardless of public gripes over flawed voter lists in the recent legislative elections the national polls body will maintain the existing registration method, which will require eligible voters to check if their names are registered for the July 8 presidential election.
The General Elections Commission (KPU) has extended the enrolment period to May 10 in a bid to encourage more voters to participate in the presidential election.
"It is the people who must take an active role to check their names on temporary voter lists because local poll committee members are still busy tabulating the votes for legislative elections," KPU member Endang Sulastri said Monday. She said that public's responsibility was outlined in the 2008 election law.
The voter list for the presidential election should have been made public on April 7, according to the KPU's original schedule. The polls body, however, failed to meet the deadline due to widespread protest against the inaccuracy of voter lists.
Political parties that may lose the elections suspect the voter list fraud benefits a certain party.
Endang said the polls body would use the final list of voters for the legislative elections as the basis of the voter list for the presidential election.
The KPU registered over 171 million voters for Thursday's legislative elections. Under a government regulation in lieu of law, more than 200,000 voters had been added to the final list, following protests against their accuracy.
But the revised list continued to be challenge, with a group of activists claiming the number of people deprived of their voting rights could reach 10 million nationwide. Many voters, on the contrary, were registered twice and dead voters remained on the list.
Endang blamed the flawed statistical data on the government. "As long as the government has not settled the NIK problems don't expect the voter lists to be 100 percent accurate," Endang said, referring to the citizens identity number.
"Our difficulty is we can't update the voter list every time. Some dead people will be in the final voter list for the presidential election."
The government said that it was ready to help the polls body improve troubled voter lists for the upcoming presidential race.
Home Affairs Minister Mardiyanto said Monday that, based on election regulations, permanent voter lists in the legislative elections could serve as the basis for temporary voter list for the presidential election.
"The KPU has issued a circular saying that it has begun drafting permanent voter list for the presidential and vice presidential election."
"Learning from the implementation of legislative elections, which saw a number of eligible voters missing from the list, it is our [the government's] duty to help the KPU update the data."
Mardiyanto added that the government was ready to provide human resources to help the commission verify the voter list.
He added that regional administrations had been asked to help the KPU officials in the field.
A number of observers have suggested that the polls body allow voters to produce their identity cards on the day of the presidential election if they are not in the KPU's list.
Nahdlatul Ulama Chairman Hasyim Muzadi said an identity card was valid evidence of a person's eligibility to vote.
He said the simple method would prevent eligible voters from losing their political rights. "An ID card is better than the voter list which was either inaccurate or flawed," he said, as quoted by Antara.
Only political parties or a coalition of parties that secure 20 percent of the House of Representatives seats or 25 percent of the popular vote will be eligible to nominate a presidential candidate.
A number of surveys have found the incumbent, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, is the most popular candidate.
A president can serve for a maximum of two five-year terms according to the Constitution.