Camelia Pasandaran – A top polling organization said that it received funding from a campaign consulting firm working on behalf of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's campaign team, in a dramatic confrontation during a press conference on Thursday.

The charge was raised by the opposition Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), chaired by former President Megawati Sukarnoputri, during a press conference held by the Indonesian Survey Institute (LSI) to release its latest poll, which showed Yudhoyono leading the presidential race with 70 percent of the vote.

Megawati was in second place with 16 percent and Vice President Jusuf Kalla had just 6 percent, according to the poll, which involved 3,000 respondents from 33 provinces.

Drawing gasps from onlookers, Maruarar Sirait, an official with Megawati and running mate Prabowo Subianto's campaign team, stood up to challenge the data on the basis of LSI's alleged ties to the Yudhoyono campaign. "We have to question their [LSI's] independence as it is funded by Fox Indonesia," he said.

Dodi Ambardi, research director at LSI, admitted after the press conference that the firm had been commissioned by Fox Indonesia, a campaign consultant working on behalf of the president's re-election campaign team.

"The latest research was fully funded by Fox Indonesia," Dodi said, claiming that the funding did not influence the group's findings. The LSI has previously denied any association with political parties.

"There was no intervention from Fox Indonesia in gathering the data for the poll," he said. "We did the survey according to the right methodology."

Burhanuddin Muhtadi, a researcher with LSI, said Fox paid about Rp 500 million ($49,000) for the latest survey since the cost of conducting research nationwide was expensive.

"The funding did not influence the result," he said. "We're a member of the World Association for Public Opinion Research and we're independent."

Anas Urbaningrum of the Democratic Party said that Fox was a Democratic Party consultant and that it cooperated with the survey organization. "All campaign teams use pollsters," he said. "But the pollster itself is not connected directly to the Democratic Party."

Effendi Gazali, a political analyst at the University of Indonesia, said that it was appropriate for pollsters to receive funding from parties or consultants but that the relationship should be disclosed to the public.

"If they did not disclose the funding, it means they are lying," he said. "There are two important things for a pollster. First, they have to reveal the funding source. Second, they have to be accurate."

Effendi said the recent legislative elections revealed flaws in LSI's surveys. "It predicted the Democratic Party would win 26.6 percent. However, in the end the Democratic Party only got 20 percent. The gap is outside of the margin of error."

The chairman of the General Elections Commission (KPU), Abdul Hafiz Anshary, said that it was unethical for pollsters to present results to the public if the pollsters were paid by political parties for the research.

"We have no regulation to stop them from announcing the result, but they should reveal the funding source."