Five Pilkada Dispute Lawsuits in Southeast Sulawesi Rejected by Constitutional Court

KENDARI, KOMPAS - Five regional head election disputes or pilkada in Southeast Sulawesi have been rejected by the Constitutional Court. The lawsuits were deemed to lack sufficient arguments and evidence to convince the judges of the submitted petitions. Several other regional election dispute lawsuits in this area are still awaiting trial.

Five regions in Southeast Sulawesi whose election dispute lawsuits have been decided by the Constitutional Court are Baubau City, Wakatobi, South Konawe, Muna, and North Kolaka. All the plaintiffs' lawsuits were deemed inadmissible.

In the reading of the verdict that began on Tuesday (4/2/2025) at 15:30 WITA, the panel of judges rejected all the lawsuits filed by the petitioners in the area. The evidence presented was deemed unconvincing, with the vote difference far exceeding the threshold for filing a lawsuit.

During the reading of the lawsuit for the North Kolaka Regional Election, for instance, constitutional judge Enny Nurbaningsih stated that various alleged violations submitted by the petitioner were considered to have been followed up during the election process. Starting from the alleged involvement of village heads to becoming suspects, sub-district heads, and civil servants, the complaints have been followed up by Bawaslu and Gakkumdu.

In addition, the special circumstances and requests for a re-vote that were not followed up on were deemed unproven. The court did not find confidence in the conditions described by the petitioner. "The court believes that the regional elections were conducted in accordance with the rules," he said.

The Kolaka Utara regional election was contested by three candidate pairs. The pair Nur Rahman Umar and Jumarding garnered the most votes with 38,105 votes, followed by the pair Sumarling and Timber with 36,216 votes, and the pair Anton and Abbas with 8,376 votes. A lawsuit was filed in the Constitutional Court by the pair Sumarling and Timber.

In the recent simultaneous regional elections, six village heads in North Kolaka were named suspects by the Election Supervisory Agency (Bawaslu). They were deemed to have violated election regulations for being considered biased towards one of the candidate pairs.

Meanwhile, regarding the other four regions, the Constitutional Court considered that various alleged violations submitted had been followed up, and were not convincing regarding the legal construction submitted. Not only that, the difference in votes between the applicant and the winning party was also above two percent.

"In the main case, it is stated that the applicant's petition cannot be accepted," said Chief Justice of the Constitutional Court (MK) Suhartoyo, Tuesday evening.

In the first session, Tuesday morning, the Constitutional Court granted six lawsuits to enter the evidentiary hearing from 58 decisions that were read out. The lawsuits were the Banjarbaru Pilkada dispute, the Tasikmalaya Regency Pilkada dispute (West Java), Magetan Regency (East Java), Pesawaran Regency (Lampung), Mimika City (Central Papua), and East Aceh Regency (Aceh).

The reading of the verdict by the Constitutional Court (MK) is a dismissal hearing for 310 regional election disputes that were filed. The inauguration of the elected regional heads will be adjusted after the reading of the verdict which will take place on February 4-5, 2025.

Minister of Home Affairs Tito Karnavian, in Jakarta, Friday (1/31/2025), said that the postponement of the inauguration of regional heads was carried out after receiving information from the Constitutional Court regarding the schedule of the dismissal hearing for the election dispute application. This hearing refers to whether or not the case related to the simultaneous regional election process on November 27, 2024 that was submitted to the Constitutional Court was dropped.

"I understand that the Constitutional Court also wants the inauguration of non-disputed and dismissed decisions to be combined to increase simultaneity. We agree with this principle, so we also ask for certainty and speed from the Constitutional Court to upload the results after they are determined," said Tito (Kompas, Friday, January 31, 2025).