Students Protest Slow Vote Count in Indonesia

JAKARTA, Indonesia — Students took to the streets of this capital today to protest the painfully slow counting of ballots from this week’s election, and some said the delay opened the door to vote-tampering.

More than 100 students rallied outside the tally room in a downtown Jakarta hotel, calling on all sides to avoid violence.

“The slow count is a cause for concern because we are worried some people may react negatively,” said University of Indonesia student Madia Madjid.

A separate protest was planned later in the day outside the General Election Commission headquarters by the radical People’s Democratic Party, or PRD.

Barely 12% of ballots have been counted since Indonesians voted Monday in their first truly multi-party election in 44 years, and there have been mounting allegations of vote-rigging.

A PRD official said the delay was being engineered to help the ruling Golkar party hang on to power.

Official figures put populist opposition leader Megawati Sukarnoputri’s Indonesian Democratic Party in Struggle in front with almost 40% of the vote and Golkar third with 16%.

But many Indonesians remain suspicious of Golkar, which for decades was used by former president Suharto to give his army-backed rule a veneer of political legitimacy.