JAKARTA, LEGAL LITERACY – The Constitutional Court (MK) held a follow-up hearing with the agenda of listening to the Respondent's answers, the Election Supervisory Body's (Bawaslu) statement, and the Relevant Party's statement for the General Election Result Dispute (PHPU) case for prospective members of the Regional People's Representative Council (DPRD) of Panai Regency, Paniai Electoral District (Dapil) 2, submitted by the United Development Party (PPP).

The hearing with case number 174-01-17-36/PHPU.DPR-DPRD-XXII/2024 was held in Panel Session Room 3 on Monday (07/05/2024) with the Panel of Judges consisting of Constitutional Justice Arief Hidayat accompanied by Constitutional Justice Anwar Usman and Constitutional Justice Enny Nurbaningsih.

In this hearing, the Respondent provided an explanation regarding the Petitioner's request, which in the previous preliminary hearing argued that there were significant discrepancies in the vote count in the regencies of Paniai and Dogiyai. The Petitioner explained that based on the Noken agreement held by the local tribal chief, the Petitioner's legislative candidate, Albertus Keiya, should have obtained far more votes than stipulated in the official recapitulation. Internal party calculations showed that Keiya received 65,587 valid votes from the agreement, but only 1,025 votes were recorded.

The Petitioner previously mentioned that the District Election Committee (PPD) of all Districts in Paniai Regency and the General Election Commission (KPU) of Paniai Regency were strongly suspected of manipulating votes by transferring the votes from the Tribal Chief Agreement, which should have been for the Legislative Candidate from the Petitioner named Albertus Keiya from the Paniai Regency Electoral District, to Komarudin Watubun from the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P).

In addition to Paniai Regency, the Petitioner also questioned similar irregularities in other Electoral Districts in the same regency and in Dogiyai Regency, where the votes that should have been obtained did not match the official KPU data.

The KPU, represented by its legal counsel, Muhammad Mukhlasir Ridla Syukranil Khitam, stated in the exception that the petitioner's request was unclear because the petitum points of the request were alternative petitums with different subjects, making it unclear what the petitioner was actually asking for.

“The petitioner's request is unclear because in the alternative petitum, the petitioner is asking for different main points, so it is not clear what the Petitioner is actually asking for,” said Ridla Syukranil.

Regarding the explained answer, the Respondent requested the Court to decide in the exception to accept and grant the respondent's exception in its entirety and in the subject matter to reject the petitioner's request in its entirety and to declare the Decree of the General Election Commission Number 360 of 2024 correct.

Bawaslu, in its statement, explained that the explanations of the Relevant Party and the Respondent were appropriate. Markus Madai explained that the correct vote acquisition was Albertus Keiya from PPP in Pania Regency with 1,025 votes and Kamariduiin Watubun in Paniai with 74,526 votes. In Dogiyai Regency, on behalf of Albertus, the number was 32,634.

“Albertus Keiya from PPP in Pania Regency with 1,025 votes and Kamariduiin Watubun in Paniai with 74,526 votes. In Dogiyai Regency, on behalf of Albertus, the number is 32,634,” said Markus.

Furthermore, in this case, there was a report, but the report did not meet the formal and material requirements.

“There is an addition, Your Honor, regarding this case, there is a report but Bawaslu has issued a status that the report does not meet the formal material requirements,” said Yonas Yonampa, Representative from Bawaslu.

The Relevant Party provided information in this case. According to Mulyadi Marks Phillian as the legal counsel for the Relevant Party, the Petitioner cannot argue to ask the KPU as the Respondent to return 65,587 votes without being based on valid and relevant evidence. According to Mulyadi, the Relevant Party's vote acquisition of 74,525 votes in Pania Regency is in accordance with the Respondent's Decision.

Furthermore, Mulyadi mentioned that for Dogiyai Regency, based on the Respondent's recapitulation, it is known that the Petitioner's votes were 32,634 votes and the Relevant Party's votes were 8,878 votes. If referring to the DPT in Dogiyai Regency, the total is around 95,655 votes, while the Petitioner argues that their votes were 95,714 votes, which exceeds the DPT.

In the Petitum, the Relevant Party requested the Court to reject the petitioner's request in its entirety and to declare the Decree of the General Election Commission Number 360 of 2024 correct.