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ocal elections bodies (KPUDs) remain divided on a government regulation-in-lieu-of law (perppu) ordering an update of the voter list.

Some regions still want to leave the door open to citizens to register as eligible voters, despite the fact the regulation only allows for the update to include all those already registered in the temporary list of voters into a permanent list.

The regulation-in-lieu-of-law, coming out less than two months before the legislative elections, was issued because registered voters were not listed in the final voter list.

However, the General Elections Commission (KPU) warned local polls bodies against including unregistered voters in the list.

"There is no more chance for new voters to register," KPU member Sri Nuryanti said.

Abdul Fatah, head of the Central Halmahera regency KPUD in Maluku, said in his regency alone there could be up to 500 new people added to the final voter list.

"Many eligible voters were working outside the regency when we opened the registration last year. But they've now returned home, so we will register them here," he told The Jakarta Post.

The KPU announced the final list of eligible voters last year. It features more than 170 million names, including 1.5 million Indonesians overseas.

Fatah said the newly established regency of Central Halmahera only had 26,371 voters spread across eight districts.

"The additional 500 new voters will increase the allocation of election material for the regency, including ballots," he said.

The 2008 legislative election law stipulates the allocation of a 2 percent surplus of ballots.

Fatah is in Jakarta along with some 500 other officials from 471 KPUDs for a two-day meeting with the KPU to discuss the regulation-in-lieu-of-law, the KPU regulations, logistics preparations, and voter education.

A member of the working group preparing elections for Indonesian migrants overseas, who declined to be named, said there would be an additional 100 new voters, mostly in Malaysia and Hong Kong.

"We have informed all our staff overseas to revise their voter lists this week," the official said.

He added that after the KPU had closed voter registration in November last year, many Indonesians had gone overseas to work or study.

"They are actually interested in taking part in the upcoming elections," the official said.

Elections monitoring groups have slammed the KPU for its poor performance in drawing up a voter list, and leaving many eligible voters unregistered.

The KPU said the revision of the to-be-revised list would increase by less than 2 percent of total voters in the final list.

This would therefore affect the KPU's logistics planning for the distribution of ballots, ink, ballot boxes and polling booths for the April 9 elections.

The West Java KPUD earlier said that about 7,000 eligible voters there were reportedly not registered on its permanent list of around 29 million voters.