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Three political newcomers to join 2024 legislative election
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Push and pull: People move ballot boxes sent in from various districts during the 2019 presidential and legislative elections at the General Elections Commission (KPU) office in Magelang, Central Java. (Antara/Anis Efizudin)
The General Elections Commission (KPU) has named three newcomer parties eligible to contest the 2024 legislative election amid reports that some commission staff members were pressured to falsify results.
The three new parties, mostly establishment breakaways, are the Indonesian People's Wave Party (Gelora), the Nusantara Awakening Party (PKN) and the Labor Party. They had passed the so-called factual assessment, KPU commissioner Hasyim Asy’ari said on Tuesday.
They will compete in the upcoming election with nine parties in the House of Representatives and five other parties that participated in the 2019 legislative election but failed to secure enough votes to send representatives to the House. This will make a total of 17 parties contesting the election, which is more than the 14 parties that participated in the 2019 general election.
“Elections are an arena to seize and maintain power […] where those who are already in power seek to remain in power, and those who don't have power look to seize power," Hasyim said in his closing speech.
The KPU’s announcement came after civil society groups, which have set up a hotline for the public to report concerns about infringements, said that a number of regional KPU officials had claimed that they were pressured by officials from the KPU’s central office in Jakarta to pass several newcomers that had actually not met the requirements.
Read also: Election officials pressured regional staff to falsify eligibility results, lawyer says
Lawyers representing some of the regional KPU officials demanded that the commission stop any attempts to manipulate the results of the so-called factual verification process and threatened to take legal action. The alleged parties in question are Gelora and the PKN, as well as the Garuda Party, which participated in the 2019 legislative election but is not currently represented in the legislature.
