US embassy cable - 04JAKARTA7036

C O N F I D E N T I A L  JAKARTA 007036 
 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/27/2014 
TAGS: PGOV, KJUS, KDEM, ID 
SUBJECT: YUDHOYONO AND MEGAWATI ENTER RUN-OFF; WIRANTO AND 
AMIEN TO CHALLENGE RESULTS 
 
REF: A. JAKARTA 69933 (WIRANTO RUMORED TO LEAD) 
     B. JAKARTA 6375 (YUDHOYONO LEADS) 
 
Classified By: POLITICAL OFFICER DAVID R. GREENBERG, REASON 1.4 (D) 
 
 
SUMMARY 
------- 
 
1. (C) The Indonesian Electoral Commission (KPU) on July 26 
certified final results from the first round Presidential 
election, placing Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and President 
Megawati Soekarnoputri into the September runoff election. 
An advisor to retired General Wiranto told us that Wiranto 
plans a Constitutional Court challenge, based on evidence 
that he received more votes than Megawati.  This advisor 
stressed that Wiranto insists on a peaceful process to 
challenge the election result, implying that some around him 
proposed protests in the streets.  Amien Rais's team also 
intends to challenge the election result, although with less 
conviction that their candidate deserves to have qualified 
for the runoff.  Amien's team will also claim Police 
officials acted in a partisan manner.  We doubt that errors 
in the vote count were material, and we do not sense 
widespread public rejection of these results.  End Summary. 
 
FINAL VOTE COUNT 
---------------- 
 
2. (U) The KPU on July 26 certified the final results of the 
July 5 first round presidential election as follows: 
 
                                         QUICK COUNT 
CANDIDATE        VOTES        PERCENT    PROJECTION 
---------        -----        -------    ----------- 
Yudhoyono        39,838,184   33.57      33.15 
Megawati         31,569,104   26.60      26.02 
Wiranto          26,286,788   22.15      23.34 
Amien            17,392,931   14.66      14.42 
Haz               3,569,861    3.01       3.29 
Total           118,656,868 
 
(Note: With 156,102,364 registered voters and 2,636,976 
invalid votes cast, this data indicates voter turnout of 77.7 
percent, down from the 84.1 percent turnout for the 
legislative election.  End Note.) 
 
TIMETABLE TO CHALLENGE THE RESULTS 
---------------------------------- 
 
3. (U) The election law provides that candidates have three 
days from the announcement of the final results to submit 
objections to the Constitutional Court.  The Court must then 
rule on those objections within 14 days.  Thus, July 29 marks 
the filing deadline, and August 12 represents the deadline 
for the Court's decision on objections submitted on the last 
day. 
 
WIRANTO'S CAMP PLANS CHALLENGE 
------------------------------ 
 
4. (C) An expatriate advisor to Wiranto told us on July 27 
that Wiranto's team definitely would file an objection with 
the Constitutional Court.  He asserted optimistically that 
the team had "an enormous amount of evidence" that Wiranto 
had lost a decisive number of legitimate votes.  When asked 
about the July 23 rumor that Wiranto led the manual vote 
count by 0.7 percent (ref A), the advisor confirmed that the 
rumored lead tracked with the Wiranto team's data; he implied 
there was more to the story of the rumor that he could not 
disclose. 
 
5. (C) The advisor claimed that the clear majority of 
"errors" in the vote count that disadvantaged Wiranto was 
deliberate.  He said Wiranto's team had consulted with a 
failed bidder on the KPU's computer system tender and had 
determined a number of vulnerabilities in the system.  He 
believed the electronic vote counting system was 
manipulated, and the manual counts were  then adjusted to 
track with the desired result.  He clearly implied -- but did 
not explicitly state -- that Megawati's team committed the 
fraud. 
 
6. (C) Wiranto's team will soon begin a public relations 
campaign to accompany its court challenge, according to the 
same advisor.  Some loyal Wiranto supporters felt cheated and 
extremely angry.  In a July 27 meeting, Wiranto had twice 
stressed that any challenges to the election result had to 
occur peacefully.  The advisor strongly implied that others 
around Wiranto counseled street protests, demonstrations, and 
similar activities.  The advisor worried that these actions 
would receive international coverage and project an image of 
instability in Indonesia. 
 
7. (C) Golkar leaders, however, continue to desert Wiranto. 
On July 26, Ferry Baldan, the Vice Chairman of the House of 
Representatives Committee on Legal Affairs (also the Vice 
Chairman of the Special Committee that drafted the election 
laws), spoke out publicly against Wiranto's earlier call for 
a manual recount, and expressed his support for the KPU's 
controversial ruling on double-punched ballots.  He did not 
address possible Constitutional Court challenges, however. 
 
AMIEN'S CAMP ALSO TO CHALLENGE RESULTS 
-------------------------------------- 
 
8. (C) National Mandate Party (PAN) Deputy Secretary General 
Alvin Lie told us on July 27 that Amien Rais's team also 
planned to file a challenge with the Constitutional Court. 
Alvin was not confident, however, that Amien could show that 
rectifying errors in the count would change the runoff 
participants.  However, Alvin said many witnesses, with data 
from voting stations throughout the country, could 
demonstrate significant errors in the vote count.  Speaking 
from memory, Alvin claimed that, when approximately 85 
million votes had been tabulated, Amien, Megawati, and 
Wiranto each had won around 20 percent of the vote.  Alvin 
bitterly criticized the KPU as dishonest, inaccurate, and 
arrogant. 
 
9. (C) Alvin also said that Amien's team would file a 
complaint in an administrative court based on illegal Police 
involvement in campaign activities.  (Note: Since July 25, 
the local press has reported on an anonymously sourced video 
showing the Regional Police Commander of Banyumas regency, 
Central Java, meeting prior to July 5 with active and retired 
police officers.  The Commander urged support for Megawati in 
the presidential race.  End Note.) 
 
COMMENT 
------- 
 
10. (C) Constitutional Court proceedings related to 
Indonesia's legislative election demonstrated that errors in 
the vote count can occur, and can be rectified.  However, the 
National Democratic Institute (NDI) quick count gives us a 
degree of confidence that errors in the July 5 vote count 
were not material.  It would require a Herculean effort to 
document, based on witness observations, that over 2.5 
million votes in Megawati's column actually were cast for 
Wiranto.  The media and general public have not expressed the 
sort of discontent that we hear from the losing candidates' 
camps.  We doubt that Wiranto's upcoming challenge will 
resonate strongly with the Indonesian electorate. 
 
BOYCE