Indonesian presidential candidate withdraws from poll process

Jakarta, July 22: Indonesian presidential candidate Prabowo Subianto and his running mate Hatta Radjasa Tuesday announced their withdrawal from the election process alleging fraud in the July 9 election.

The pair ordered their team taking part in the vote recapitulation process being held in the General Election Commission (KPU) to walk out, rejecting any legal decision issued by the KPU related to the election, Xinhua reported.

The announcement was made in Prabowo Subianto's camp headquarters in the House of Polonia, East Jakarta, while the vote recapitulation process in the KPU was under way.

"We withdraw from the ongoing election process. We don't want to sacrifice the mandate given by the people," Prabowo said.

Prabowo said that his lawyer and election witnesses found that many frauds took place during the presidential election July 9 in several areas across the country.

Prabowo regarded the alleged during the election as structured, massive and systematic.

He said that the KPU apparently defied recommendations issued by the Election Monitoring Body (Bawaslu) to hold re-polling in areas where the frauds allegedly took place.

The KPU is scheduled to release the vote tally results this afternoon, qualifying the winner of election.

As of settlement of vote recapitulation in provinces across the country, Prabowo's rival Joko Widodo pocketed 52 percent vote, or 5 percent higher than Prabowo.

IANS