TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - The Indonesian people should be grateful for the peaceful and successful legislative election held on Wednesday last week.
After receiving a report from the Chief of the National Police, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono announced that the voting all across the country went smoothly.
The success has dismissed the fear of the Election Honorary Board Chief Jimly Asshiddique that the election would be marred with chaos.
Three are indeed several irregularities found, among other lack of ballot papers in several regions. It happened for example in 32 polling stations in Sikka, East Nusa Tenggara. As a result, voters there cast their votes on Saturday.
This is only a minor case compared with the big scale of the election. However, although it is a minor case, these logistic issues should have been immediately addressed as it always happens in every election.
The Election Commission (KPU) should improve the monitoring mechanism and check the distribution of ballot papers.
News about unregistered voters that often emerged in the previous elections now happens less frequently.
It shows that the step taken by the commission to tighten up registration for votes across the regions and to build an integrated database has shown its good results.
A special attention must also be given to isolated regions like Papua.
The disappearance of eight ballot boxes for legislative candidates that have been cast by voters in Timika Jaya village, Timika must be seriously addressed. The commission must strengthen security in shipping documents, from the polling stations to the next posts.
The commotion that once happened in Jayapura must not be repeated.
There, dozens of people set fire to a polling station in Kotaraja, Abepura early morning in Thursday. They burned a house and a motorcycle. The commission and the police must immediately investigate the case and bring the perpetrator to justice.
We must not let these irresponsible people disrupt the democratic process that has been done peacefully in the country.
Apart from the logistic issues and problems, on the whole, the legislative election was a success.
The success also reinforced the opinion of former President of the Germany Federal, Christian Wulff, that Indonesia is the third biggest democratic country after India and the US in the world that have successfully practice democracy. It is the success that has been made after the last several elections that have to be maintained.
Certainly, there remains several aspects, which are as important as the voting itself that have to be improved.
The commission still has to struggle to maintain the stability and safety in the vote counting and the announcement of the voting result.
Those political parties must also support the commission. It would not be wise if those political parties try to disrupt the work of the commission just because their candidates lose the election.
Everyone must help to monitor the vote counting so that this already good process remains free from any violations.
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