P

oll watchdogs have called on the government to issue a regulation-lieu-of-law perppu, to allow unregistered voters to use identity cards to vote in the upcoming presidential elections.

Hadar N. Gumay, director of the Centre for Electoral Reform, said the government and the General Elections Commission (KPU) should create a ruling to allow people to vote using their ID cards.

"Eligible voters who are not registered should be allowed to vote with their ID card or a letter from their community leader *RT*.

"The government needs to issue a perppu to regulate it," Hadar told reporters Thursday.

"Otherwise, incidents in the recent legislative election, where millions of eligible voters were prevented from voting, will recur in the July poll."

Jeirry Sumampow, executive director of the Indonesian Election Committee (TEPI) agreed with Hadar, saying the polling body could apply the 2004 election system, where eligible voters used their ID cards to vote.

"It seems to me, that KPU members *throw'many ideas to the public but lack the capacity to implement them."

Jeirry also aid that the KPU's plan to register voters by visiting citizens "door to door", would exceed the one-month time period allocated for updating the list.

A number of poll watchdogs and political parties claim that 45 million eligible voters were not registered to vote in the legislative election, although the KPU registered more than 171 million voters.

Many unregistered voters attempted to use their ID cards to vote in the recent election but were rejected by the local election committees (PPS).

Andi Nurpati, a KPU member, insisted that unregistered people would be unable to vote in the presidential elections.

"This is in accordance with the election law,"Andi said.

She said the polling body had urged Home Minister Mardiyanto to order his staff in communities and neighborhoods (RT/RW), to register eligible voters.

Mardiyanto said the government was ready to provide human resources to help the commission verify the voter list.

However, the KPU will use the current list for the presidential election.

A group of activists claims the number of people deprived of their voting rights could reach 45 million people nationwide.

Under a government regulation-in-lieu-of-law, more than 200,000 voters would be added to the current voter list.

The controversial voter list, containing ghost voters, has been accused of benefiting certain parties.

The KPU has asked the government for a perppu to allow it to update the legislative election voter list.

The KPU regulation said voter lists for the presidential election should have been made public on April 7.

The polling body, however, failed to meet the deadline due to widespread protest against the inaccuracy of the list.