Election In Indonesia

Elections in Indonesia have taken place since 1955. At a national level, Indonesian people elect a head of state – the president – and a legislature. The president is elected for a five-year term, as are the 550-member People's Representative Council (Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat, DPR) and the 128-seat Regional Representatives Council (Dewan Perwakilan Daerah).

The Council is elected by proportional representation from multi-candidate constituencies. Under Indonesia's multi-party system, no one party has yet been able to secure an outright victory; parties have needed to work together in coalition governments.

The voting age in Indonesia is 17.

1955

The first elections were originally planned for January 1946, but because the Indonesian National Revolution was still underway, this was not possible. After the war, every cabinet had elections in its program. In February 1951 the Natsir cabinet introduced an election bill, but the cabinet fell before it could be debated. The next cabinet, led by Sukiman did hold some regional elections [1] Finally, in February 1952, the Wilopo cabinet introduced a bill for voter registration. Discussions in the People's Representative Council did not start until September because of various objections from the political parties. According to Feith, there were three factors. Firstly, legislators were worried about losing their seats; secondly they were worried about a possible swing to Islamic parties and thirdly an electoral system in accordance with the Provisional Constitution of 1950 would mean less representation for regions outside Java.[2] Given the fact that cabinets had fallen after introducing controversial measures, there was reluctance to introduce an election bill and there were concerns about possible political conflicts caused by electioneering.[3] However, many political leaders wanted elections as the existing legislature was based on a compromise with Dutch and as such had little popular authority. They also believed elections would bring about greater political stability. [4] The "17 October 1952 affair", when armed soldiers in front of the palace demanded dissolution of the legislature, led to greater demands from all parties for early elections. By 25 November, an elections bill had been submitted to the People's Representative Council. After 18 weeks of debate and 200 proposed amendments, the bill passed on 1 April 1953 and became law on 4 April. It stipulated one member of the legislature for 150,000 residents and gave the right to vote to everybody over the age of 18, or who was or had been married.[5] Once the bill had passed the cabinet began appointing members of the Central Electoral Committee. This was to have one member from each government party and an independent chairman. However, the Indonesian National Party (PNI) protested that they had no members on the committee, and this dispute was still unresolved when the cabinet fell on 2 June.

On 25 August 1953, the new prime minister, Ali Sastroamidjojo, announced a 16-month schedule for elections starting from January 1954. On 4 November the government announced a new Central Electoral Committee chaired by PNI member S. Hadikusomo and including all the parties represented in the government, namely Nahdatul Ulama (NU), the Indonesia Islamic Union Party (PSII) the Indonesia People's Party (PRI), the National People's Party (PRN), the Labor Party and the Indoneisan Peasant Front (BTI), as well as the government-supporting Islamic Educators Association (Perti) and the Indonesian Christian Party (Parkindo).

Campaign
Campaign posters with the symbols of the parties on display in the run up the election

According to Feith, the first phase of the election campaign began on 4 April 1953 when the election bill passed into law, and the second phase when the Central Electoral Committee approved the party symbols on 31 May 1954

At the time the bill passed into law, the cabinet was a coalition of the Islamic Masjumi and nationalistic PNI. The next two cabinets were coalitions led by one of these parties with the other in opposition. Therefore, the main campaign issue was the debate debate between these two over the role of Islam in the state. Masjumi denied aiming for an Islamic state, while the PNI emphasized their pro-Pancasila stance was not anti-Islam. The two other main Islamic parties, the NU and the PSII supported Masjumi in this debate. A third factor was the Communist Party of Indonesia (PKI), which campaigned on issues of poverty and the poor lot of the people due to the continued imperialist nature of cabinet policy. Masjumi tried to draw a clear line between the PKI and other parties, accusing it of being a tool of Moscow.

Party programs were rarely discussed during the campaign. Party symbols with or without slogans were displayed on streets in towns and villages, on private homes, public buildings, buses, trees and calenders. The PKI made extraordinary efforts to promote its symbol, displaying it everywhere to make sure people did not forget it. The PKI campaign was based around social activities such as organizing tool sharing for farmers and building irrigation channels. The party was looking beyond the election to build a permanent basis of support.
The electoral regions Indonesia was divided into for the 1955 elections

In the last few months of the campaign, the major parties focused on educating voters in areas where they had managed to establish village-level organization. This phase included persuasion and threats.

All through September, party leaders were constantly traveling around the country. Daily party newspapers were printed in increasing numbers and given away for free. Articles in dailies these attacked rival parties. In the villages, the emphasis shifted from from large rallies to small meetings and house-house canvassing

Results
The share of the vote. Four parties won almost 80% of the vote

The election was a major success for the NU, which saw its number of seats in the People's Representative Council increase from 8 to 45. A surprise was the poor showing of Masyumi, the Socialist Party and Murba. There was a large gap between the "big 4" (PNI, Masjumi, NU and PKI, with more than three quarters of the vote shared among them) and the rest of the parties, but contrary to people's hopes, the number of parties actually increased - there were now 28 with seats in the legislature as opposed to 20 before the election. However, the largest party held only 22% of seats.

The distribution of votes was uneven across the country. The PNI won 85.97% of its vote in Java, the NU 85.6% and the PKI 88.6%, despite the fact that only 66.2% of the population lived on Java. Conversely only 51.3% of Masjumi's vote came from Java, and it established itself as the leading party for the one third of people living outside Java.

Indonesia's first general election elected members of the DPR and the Constitutional Assembly of Indonesia (Konstituante). The election was organised by the government of Prime Minister Ali Sastroamidjojo. Sastroamidjojo himself declined to stand for election, and Burhanuddin Harahap became Prime Minister.

The election occurred in two stages:

* The election of the members of the People's Representative Council, which took place on 29 September 1955. Twenty-nine political parties and individuals took part;
* The election for the members of the Constitutional Assembly, which took place on 15 December 1955.

The five largest parties in the election were the National Party of Indonesia (Partai Nasional Indonesia), Masyumi, Nahdlatul Ulama, the Communist Party of Indonesia (Partai Komunis Indonsia, PKI), and the Indonesian Islam Alliance Party (Partai Syarikat Islam Indonesia).

1971

Following the Transition to the New Order from 1965-1967, the army-backed New Order regime announced that the Golkar organization would be its political vehicle. The regime stressed that Golkar (meaning "functional group") was not a political party. In order to give General Ali Murtopo time to turn Golkar into an organization fit to command a majority in the legislature, the general election originally planned for no later than July 5, 1968 was postponed to no later than July 5 1971.[1]

After a time with no word from the government concerning the forthcoming election, on October 22, 1968, the Sinar Harapan daily reported a statement by President Suharto to the effect that the government had begun to take the necessary steps to organize the poll. A General Election Board was established in mid-1969 headed by Interior Minister Amirmachmud[2]. On September 23, 1970, the ballot paper numbers and electoral symbols for the 10 election participants were announced

Government Manipulation
Officials recording the votes cast for each party in the Operations Room at the Home Affairs Ministry on 2 August 1971

In order to weaken possible rivals to Golkar, the government manipulated the top two parties from the 1955 election, the Indonesian National Party and Parmusi (the successor to Masjumi following that party's banning in 1960) such that they lost credibility in the eyes of voters.[1] Given that the party that had come fourth, the Indonesian Communist Party, had been banned in the aftermath of the 30 September Movement coup attempt in 1965, that left only the Nahdatul Ulama as a major rival.[4]

Away from the political parties, civil servants were effectively obliged to vote Golkar and regional administrators were required to fulfill "quotas" of Golkar votes.[1]

The system of allocating seats was changed from that of the 1955 election to reduce the number of parties winning seats in the legislature. All seats were to be allocated in the regional electoral districts, rather than being divided up based on national results

This election, the first after the establishment of the "New Order", took place on 5 July 1971. Ten political parties participated.

The five largest political parties were Golkar, Nahdlatul Ulama, Parmusi, the National Party of Indonesia and the Indonesian Islam Alliance Party.

1977-1997)

Elections following the mergers were held under the government of President Suharto. In accordance with the legislation, these were contested by three groups; Golkar, the PPP and the PDI. All elections in this period were won by Golkar.

To ensure that Golkar always won more than 60 percent of the popular vote, the New Order regime used a number of tactics. These included:

Reducing the number of opponents
In 1973, the existing political parties were forced to merge into the United Development Party (PPP) and the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI). These were the only parties allowed to contest general elections.

Weakening the remaining opponents
The two political parties were forbidden to criticize government policy, and the government had to approve all slogans they used. Furthermore, they were not allowed to organize at the village level (where the majority of Indonesians live). To stop the rise of charismatic figures, their candidates had to be vetted by the government. When a potentially charismatic figure (in the form of founding president Sukarno's daughter Megawati Sukarnoputri) became leader of the PDI, the government engineered a political convention in Medan in 1996 to remove her. Ironically, the ensuing disturbances at the PDI's Jakarta headquarters began a chain of events that indirectly led to the downfall of the New Order.

Coercion to vote Golkar
Civil servants were ordered to support Golkar, or face accusations of insubordination. Private sector workers were reminded of the need for "stability". Many people believed the vote was not secret, and the government did little to persuade them otherwise. Many voters were still at school, and they were warned by teachers of a link between their choice at the ballot box and exam success

The vote-counting process
The Golkar votes were counted first, then those of the two other parties. In the 1997 election, by 9pm on the day after voting, Golkar had already been awarded 94% of its eventual vote. By contrast, the PPP had been credited with less than 10% of its final tally.

Vote-rigging
Although the counting at the local ballot boxes was conducted in public, with the ballot papers held up and the scores marked on boards, it was at the later stages where irregularities were frequently reported.

Multiple voting
There was no effective way of determining who had already voted, allowing many to do so more than once

Election results 1977-1997 Year PPP Golkar PDI
Votes % Votes % Votes %
1977 18,743,491 29.29 39,750,096 62.11 5,504,757 8.60
1982 20,871,880 27.78 48,334,724 64.34 5,919,702 7.88
1987 13,701,428 15.97 62,783,680 73.17 9,324,708 10.87
1992 16,624,647 17.00 66,599,331 68.10 14,565,556 14.89
1997 25,341,028 22.43 84,187,907 74.51 3,463,226 3.07

1999

Under the New Order, only two political parties forcibly merged in 1973 plus the functional group 'Golkar' had been allowed to participate in elections[1][2]. With the start of the Reform Era, more than 100 new political parties emerged[3]. New elections were called for 1999 and 148 parties registered with the Ministry of Justice and Human Rights. Of these, only 48 passed the selection process, overseen by intellectual Nurcholish Madjid[4][5] The elections were to be overseen by an independent General Elections Commission (KPU) of 53 members, one from each party and five government representatives[6]

Electoral System

The system used was based on proportional representation at the provincial level. Within each province, parties were awarded seats in proportion to their share of the vote. The largest number of seats was in East Java province, with 82, while the lowest was in Bengkulu and East Timor with 4 each. Voters chose parties, not people as the candidate list was closed, meaning the decision as to who would sit in the legislature was decided by the parties

Campaign

The official election campaign began on May 19 1999 and ended on June 4 to allow two 'rest days' before the vote itself. It was divided into three stages, with different parties being allowed to campaign on different days. However before the campaign there was violence between supporters of rival parties. Four people were killed in fighting between followers of the United Development Party and the National Awakening Party on May 1 and three more died in clashes between Golkar and Indonesian Democratic Party-Struggle supporters on May 11.

On the first day of the campaign, there was a parade of party vehicles in Central Jakarta. The Golkar float was attacked and damaged. The traffic circle in front of the Hotel Indonesia was a popular spot for rallies. Meanwhile there was an increase of people heading for Singapore to escape possible violence as polling day neared, with one newspaper reporting that more than 78,000 people had left.

As well as rallies, the major parties took out full color advertisements in newspapers. Each party was also given air time TV for statements by lone spokespeople. There were also ads in the newspapers urging people to use their vote

In the final week, the main parties held huge rallies in the capital: the National Awakening Party on June 1, the National Mandate Party on June 2, the Indonesian Democratic Party-Struggle on June 3 and Golkar on June 4, at which its supporters were attacked.

At one minute past midnight on June 5, all party flags, banners and posters began to be removed as the campaign officially ended. International observers continued to arrive to oversee the election, among them former US president Jimmy Carter

Results
The national results showing parties achieving the largest vote share per province

The count was slow, with votes taking several weeks to count. Before he left Indonesia, Carter expressed his concern about this [28] At a meeting at the General Election Commission building on June 26, only 22 of the 53 members of the commission were prepared to accept the result. These comprised the representatives of 17 of the parties (with 93% of the vote between them) and the five government representatives. Eventually, later that same day President Jusuf Habibie in a live TV broadcast declared the results were valid. The Indonesian Democratic Party-Struggle led by Megawati Sukarnoputri had won the largest share of the vote with Golkar in second place.

The process of allocating seats in the People's Representative Council took several months The Indonesian Election Committee (PPI)announced the results on September 1. A total of 21 parties had won seats, with the Indonesian Democratic Party-Struggle being awarded 153 and Gollkar 120. There were ten parties with only one seat each

2004

Presidential elections were held in Indonesia on Monday July 5, and Monday September 20, 2004. In the second round former security minister Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono defeated incumbent President Megawati Sukarnoputri. Yudhoyono was inaugurated on October 20.

These were the first direct presidential elections in the history of Indonesia. Previously the President of Indonesia had been elected indirectly, by the legislature.

Results

Former security minister Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono won the first round with 33% of the vote. Incumbent President Megawati Sukarnoputri was second with 26%, ahead of former armed forces chief Wiranto on 22%.

Yudhoyono did not do as well as had been expected from earlier opinion polls, while Megawati did better than expected. This was attributed by Indonesian observers to Yudhoyono's lack of a nation-wide party machine, such as Megawati's PDI-P and Wiranto's Golkar, which can effectively mobilize voters in the outlying provinces.

The counting of 113 million votes, already a huge task in such a large and diverse country, was made more difficult by problems with the ballot papers. Voters cast their ballots by making a hole in the ballot paper with a nail, above the photo of their preferred candidate. Because the ballot paper was handed to voters folded in half, many made the hole without unfolding the ballot, thus making two holes and invalidating their vote. Hundreds of thousands of these votes were invalidated before the General Election Committee (KPU) ruled that such ballots should be accepted.[1] This necessitated recounts in many places, slowing the count and raising fears of a disputed result.
e • d Summary of the 5 July and 20 September 2004 Indonesian presidential election results Candidates for President Party First round Second round
Votes % Votes %
Susilo B.Y. Democratic Party : 36,051,236 (33.58) 69.266.350 (60.62)
Megawati S PDIP : 28,171,063 (26.24) 44.990.704 (39.38)
Wiranto Golkar: 23,811,028 (22.18)
Amien Rais National Mandate Party : 16,035,565 (14.94)
Hamzah Haz United Development Party : 3,275,011 (3.06)
Total 106,228,247 (100.0) 114.257.054 (100.0)
Source: KPU

Candidates

The candidates in the 2004 Indonesian presidential election were:

* Incumbent President Megawati Sukarnoputri, first elected in 1999 as vice-president of Abdurrahman Wahid, then promoted to be president via Special Meeting of People's Consultative Assembly in 2001, was seeking a second term at these elections. Her party, the Indonesian Democratic Party-Struggle (PDI-P), polled only 18.5 % of the vote in the 2004 legislative election, suggesting that she would have an uphill battle to gain re-election. Her administration was criticised for inertia and corruption. Megawati chose Hasyim Muzadi as her vice-presidential candidate. Hasyim Muzadi is the Chairman of the Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), Indonesia’s largest Islamic organisation. Most polls before the election placed her in third place. Her position was weakened by public discontent with the faltering economy, endemic corruption and perceptions of increased insecurity.

* Former security minister Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono was the candidate of three parties: Democratic Party (PD), Indonesian Justice and Unity Party (PKPI), and Crescent Star Party (PBB). His vice-presidential candidate was Jusuf Kalla, a well-known businessman and a member of Golkar party. His party won significant support in the legislative election, despite having little organization. Before the legislative election, polls suggested Yudhoyono was the most popular president candidate. Polls in June showed that Yudhoyono had a commanding lead.

* Former armed forces chief Wiranto was nominated by Golkar, the former ruling party of the Suharto era, after he won a majority vote at the 2004 Golkar convention. His vice-presidential candidate was Salahuddin Wahid (also known as Gus Solah), brother of former president Abdurrahman Wahid and like him a high ranking member of the National Awakening Party (PKB). Before being appointed, Gus Solah was a member of National Human Rights Commission (Komnas HAM). The combination of the two was interesting because Wiranto had been accused of human rights violations in East Timor.

* The National Mandate Party (PAN) appointed Amien Rais as its presidential candidate. His vice-presidential running mate was Siswono Yudo Husodo. He had the support of several small political parties as well as the significant Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), which commands more than 7% of the national vote. Amien was one of the leaders who helped overthrow the Suharto regime. Before the election, Amien was the head of the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR).

* Incumbent Vice-President Hamzah Haz and Agum Gumelar were the presidential and vice-presidential hopefuls of the Development Unity Party (PPP). Although the PPP won more than 8% of the vote in the legislative election, opinion polls showed that Hamzah Haz was not as popular as his party. He invariably placed last in opinion polls.

The National Awakening Party (PKB) did not nominate a presidential candidate. Their chosen candidate, former president Abdurrahman Wahid, was ruled out by the courts because he was not physically fit (nor mentally fit, according to his critics). The PKB leaders put their weight behind Wiranto. Observers doubted that the party followers would follow their leaders' recommendation. At one point Wahid told his followers not to vote for anyone on election day, but after pressure from the party he decided to retract that statement.

The other party eligible to field a candidate in the presidential election, the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), decided not to nominate a candidate. The party instead supported Amien Rais.

The field of candidates for the presidential election was partly determined by the results of the legislative election, held on April 5. Indonesian election law provides that presidential candidates must be nominated by – but not necessarily be members of – a party or coalition that wins at least 5% of votes in the parliamentary election, or 3% of the 550 seats (that is, 17 seats) in the People's Representative Council (DPR).