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strong>Sept. 30, online

Incumbent Jakarta Governor Basuki '€œAhok'€ Tjahaja Purnama has confirmed that he will seek reelection in 2017 as an independent candidate and will collect 1 million photocopies of Jakarta residents'€™ IDs, although the Constitutional Court has relaxed the requirement for independent candidates.

'€œI, however, insist on obtaining 1 million ID photocopies. It will convince me that Jakartans want me to run as an independent candidate,'€ Ahok said on Wednesday as quoted by tribunnews.com.

The court on Tuesday ordered that the benchmark minimum amount of support for independent candidates for governors, mayors and regents should be based on the final voters'€™ list in each region, instead of its population as stated in the original law.

In the last election, Jakarta had nearly 7 million voters. And an independent candidate therefore would be required to collect 7.5 percent of this total or about 525,000 ID photocopies.

Your comments:

I appreciate people like Mr. Ahok. Push forward with your initiatives and programs for the good of Indonesia. May you be successful.

M. Pinem

I wish Ahok the very best and sincerely hope he wins, however with the political and wealthy backing of parties, the other candidates might possibly be at an advantage with their ability to '€œbuy'€ votes.

It would be excellent if Ahok won. It would be a huge slap to the big political parties backing other candidates.

Willo

Excellent news, but will the people of Jakarta vote for him? Let'€™s hope there are lots of candidates so that the election is democratic.

Terry McAsse

Good luck, Ahok. I hope after you have steered Jakarta in the right direction that you take up politics at the national level.

Jakfan

Go Ahok!! I wish you all the best! You have my vote.

Simba

Vote for a better Jakarta. Vote Ahok.

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