Anyone Disturbing Post-Election Process Will Be Punished: TNI and Polri
Jakarta. The top brass of the Indonesian military and police met on Thursday (18/04), a day after Indonesians went to the polls to elect a president and legislative representatives, to evaluate and prepare security plans for the long process of counting the ballot papers.
Chief Security Minister Wiranto, also present at the meeting, said the country's first simultaneous presidential and legislative elections had gone smoothly and peacefully, thanks to the combined efforts of election organizer the General Elections Commission (KPU) and security forces.
The KPU is now counting ballot papers from more than 800,000 polling stations that have been delivered from all over the country. It is expected to announce the final results on May 22.
Meanwhile, pollsters have already finished their quick counts, which point to an easy win for incumbent Joko "Jokowi" Widodo and his running mate, cleric Ma’ruf Amin, who collected 54.5 percent of the votes.
Rivals Prabowo Subianto, a former Army general, and his billionaire running mate Sandiaga Uno, won 45.5 percent.
Jokowi has urged his supporters to be patient and wait for official announcement from the KPU before declaring victory, even though he has already received congratulatory calls from at least 21 foreign leaders, including Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Singapore's Lee Hsien Loong.
Prabowo meanwhile is still refusing to concede defeat and has claimed victory four times since Wednesday despite the quick count results.
On Friday, his supporters gathered at his residence in South Jakarta for a street party to celebrate their self-proclaimed victory.
Prabowo's running mate Sandiaga Uno once again did not turn up at the victory party.
Also conspicuous by their absence were representatives from the Democratic Party and the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS). Both are part of the coalition backing Prabowo's fourth tilt at the presidency.
Democratic Party chairman, former president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, sent a letter to top officials of his party on Thursday night, urging them not to take part in any "unconstitutional action" and to withdraw temporarily from the Prabowo campaign team.
TNI and Polri Look Out for "Unconstitutional Acts"
At Thursday's security coordination meeting, Indonesian Military chief Gen. Hadi Tjahjanto warned that people who try to disturb the post-election process will be harshly dealt with.
"We will not tolerate any attempt to disturb order, or any unconstitutional act that can damage our democracy. Firm actions will be taken if that happens," Hadi said.
Hadi was accompanied by top military and police officials including National Police chief Gen. Tito Karnavian.
Tito said any protest or report of election rule violations should be lodged with the Elections Monitoring Agency (Bawaslu).
"TNI [the Indonesian Military] and Polri [the police] will not hesitate to punish those who act outside the law, or try to disturb security and order unconstitutionally," Tito said.
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