he Jakarta General Elections Commission (KPU Jakarta) officially declared on Saturday that the incumbent candidate pair Jakarta Governor Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama and Djarot Saiful Hidayat would face Anies Baswedan and Sandiaga Uno in the head-to-head runoff scheduled for April 19.
In the first round, Ahok-Djarot came in first while Anies-Sandiaga came in second, pushing Agus Harimurti Yudhoyono and Sylviana Murni out of the race.
Ahok-Djarot and Anies-Sandi had garnered votes with a three percent margin, as the former collected 2,364,577 votes followed by the latter with 2,197,333, KPU Jakarta chairman Sumarno said.
He said the campaign period for the runoff would start on March 7 and run through April 15, during which, the incumbent candidates would be required to take leave from City Hall again.
(Read also: Bawaslu urges Ahok, Anies to pause campaigns)
Saturday evening was marred by the walk-out incident by the Ahok-Djarot team as the event started late. The event, held in Borobodur Hotel was scheduled to begin at 7.30 p.m., but by 8 p.m. the organizers had yet to commence the event. The team claimed that they had been at the hotel since 7 p.m.
"We saw the organizer was unprofessional. We really appreciated KPU Jakarta's invitation so we came on time and left several events, which we could have attended this evening," Djarot said in a press conference in the other room at the hotel.
Sumarno said that he had apologized to Ahok and Djarot for the late event and did not mean to make the pair wait. (rin)
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