Papua's gubernatorial vote count disputed

The Jakarta Post ,  Jakarta   |  Sat, 04/08/2006 9:44 AM

Nethy Dharma Somba, The Jakarta Post, Jayapura

Former candidates Lukas Enembe and Arobi Aituarauw are challenging the results of the Papua gubernatorial election in court. Official results showed Barnabas Suebu and his running mate Alex Hessegem were elected to lead Papua from 2006 to 2011.

The Lukas-Arobi camp brought suit at the Jayapura High Court on Wednesday, accusing the Barnabas pair of tampering with 17,000 ballots in Kurima district, Yahukimo regency.

S. Roy Rening, a lawyer for Lukas and Arobi, said in Jayapura on Friday that the vote tampering cost his clients the election. ""If the votes for Pak Lukas were not cut, he would surely have finished ahead of Pak Barnabas by 60,000 votes,"" Roy said.

In a bid to counter the accusation, the Barnabas-Alex camp filed a similar lawsuit at the Jayapura High Court alleging vote rigging by its competitor in a number of regencies.

""We registered our lawsuit at the Jayapura High Court after finding vote rigging at several polling stations,"" Steve Waramuri, a lawyer for the Barnabas-Alex camp, said Friday.

Field findings showed there was vote tampering by candidate No. 3 in the regencies of Paniai, Puncak Jaya, Jayawijaya and Yahukimo, he said, referring to the Lukas-Arobi pair.

He explained that the Barnabas-Alex lawsuit was filed one day after the lawsuit by Lukas-Arobi.

Steve said that even though his clients had been declared the winners of the election, the process of justice had to be upheld.

Besides the vote-tampering lawsuit, the Barnabas-Alex camp also brought a complaint of electoral bribery to the Papua Police against the Lukas-Arobi pair, Steve said.

Steve and his colleague Piet Ell went to Papua Police Headquarters to hand over cash amounting to Rp 100 million (US$10,801), alleged to be bribes.

Steve said the money was given by a supporter of Lukas to the treasurer of the regional election committee at Anggruk district in Yahukimo with the aim of boosting the votes for Lukas's ticket.

""We will follow up the report and we expect the lawyer to prepare witnesses,"" said the head of the Papua Police criminal unit, Paulus Waterpauw.

The Lukas camp strongly denied the bribery charge. ""We believe all the votes from the residents of that mountain were given to Pak Lukas and Arobi,"" said Carolus Boli, secretary of Lukas's campaign team.

""Whatever the reports, the most important thing is that they prove it,"" he added.

In response to the lawsuits over the vote counting, Papua General Elections Commission (KPUD) chairman Marthen Ferry Kareth said he was ready to defend the results.

""KPUD Papua has appointed a lawyer to counter any lawsuits (against the results of the ballot counting). We are prepared because it is part of the democratization process,"" he said.

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