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s the nation gears up for general elections in 2014, poll organizers find themselves in a race against time to establish an Election Monitoring Body (Bawaslu) in each province.

The presence of regional Bawaslu offices is needed to monitor the election process, including the registration of potential candidates, which may begin as early as August.

Citing Election Law No. 8/2012, Bawaslu member Nelson Simanjuntak said the registration process for the election participants should begin 20 months before the voting day, meaning it will begin in August this year.

“With the registration process beginning in August, the regional branches of Bawaslu should be formed at least in July,” Nelson said at a discussion on the 2014 elections in Jakarta on Tuesday.

Nelson was concerned about the delayed establishment of regional Bawaslu, fearing that a last-minute rush would not put forward the best individuals to sit on the monitoring body.

“The recruitment process will take up to three months, but apparently the process has not yet begun,” he added.

In addition, Nelson said Bawaslu had not allocated funds to finance the recruitment of regional Bawaslu members. This indicated a lack of attention given to ensuring the transparency of the 2014 election process, said Nelson.

Ray Rangkuti of the Indonesian Civilized Circle (LIMA) said the election process could not commence before the monitoring body was formed.

“The problem is always the same — the focus is only on the election [candidates] and the election organizers,” he said.

Ray added that he hoped the Bawaslu in the regions would appoint qualified members so that they would be able to deal with election problems, including the monitoring the sources of campaign funds, vote tabulation and certifying the final results of the election.

“We should have better quality members to overcome these repeated problems,” said Ray. “And we can have a better monitoring body if the recruitment process is well prepared,” he added.

As stipulated in Election Law No. 8/2012, Bawaslu should be formed in all provinces, to replace the role of the existing Election Supervisory Committee (Panwaslu) to monitor regional elections in the future.

Poll watchdog Jeirry Sumampow mentioned that by forming regional monitoring bodies, chances were the monitoring tasks would overlap with the previously formed Panwaslu in several provinces, which plans to monitor upcoming regional elections in Papua, South Sulawesi, West Kalimantan, North Sumatra and DKI Jakarta.

“The forming of regional Bawaslu, while the Panwaslu is still conducting their duties in the provinces, I fear may cause an overlap and create gaps that can be used to challenge the election results, as is very common in regional elections,” said Jeirry. (nad)