Tempo
Interactive - May 1, 2009
Nurochman
Arrazie, Bandar Lampung – Hundreds of workers and students from the Volunteers
of the People’s Struggle for the Liberation of the Motherland or Spartan
commemorated Labour Day in a protest at the Lampung regional General Election
Commission (KPU) offices. They were demanding that the KPU resign because it
committed fraud in the recent legislative elections by manipulating the final
voter list (DPT).
“Millions of
workers in Indonesia were unable to use their right to vote in the April 9
elections because they were not included on the final voter list”, said Spartan
coordinator Dewa Putu Adi Wibawa on Friday May 1.
The
demonstrators marched from the Bandar Lampung Elephant Monument to the KPU
offices and the Lampung provincial Election Supervisory Committee (Panwaslu)
carrying a bier with the writing “Democracy is Dead”.
In front of
the KPU office the workers held a theatrical action depicting irregularities in
the elections such as money politics, vote inflation and manipulation of the
final voter list, which ending with the bier being set on fire.
According to
Dewa, the administration of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (SBY) and the
KPU colluding to muzzle the political rights of the working class. “The
evidence is that only 1.5 million workers out of 6.5 [million] overseas workers
were registered as voters. SBY’s victory means the continued survival of
foreign companies in Indonesia that largely bring suffering the working class
and ordinary people”, said Dewa.
Dewa also
responded positively to the National Human Rights Commission’s (Komnas HAM)
investigation into manipulation of the final voter list in Lampung. Over the
last three days a Komnas HAM team led by commission member Nelson Simanjutak
has been investigating human rights violations in the Lampung elections. They
have already questioned members of the KPU and the Lampung provincial Panwaslu.
[Translated
by James Balowski.]
