Bawaslu: There Were No Violations Of Risma's Letter In The Surabaya Pilkada

Mayor of Surabaya Tri Rismaharini (Photo: humas.surabaya.go.id)

JAKARTA - The Surabaya Election Supervisory Agency (Bawaslu) decided that the citizen's report regarding the letter issued by the Mayor of Surabaya, Tri Rismaharini, to come to the TPS to vote for candidate pair Serial Number 01 Eri Cahyadi-Armuji cannot be continued in the investigation process.

"It has been decided, there are no elements of violation of the letter issued by Mrs. Risma. As if no one mentioned the name of the Surabaya mayor, there is no Surabaya City Government letterhead," said Head of Bawaslu Surabaya M Agil Akbar in Surabaya, reported by Antara, Wednesday, November 16th.

The decision was issued after conducting research, examination and discussion with the Surabaya Gakkumdu (Integrated Law Enforcement) Center, namely Bawaslu Surabaya, Surabaya Police and the Surabaya District Prosecutor's Office.

Besides that, continued Agil, the letter also contained the barcode. However, after being scanned, the barkot did not refer to the Surabaya City Government, but appeared on the East Java PDI Perjuangan website.

According to him, Article 71 of the Pilkada Law is interpreted as a formal offense, namely an offense that does not have to cause consequences, and it is suspected that the letter issued by Risma was made to benefit one of the candidate pairs, namely candidate pair number 01.

Even though the formal offense can be proven otherwise, he continued, that at the TKP according to report number 50, candidate pair number 01 lost, thus proving that the element of offense was either beneficial or detrimental to one of the parties.

"So that the decision on the report addressed to Mrs. Risma could not proceed to the investigation process. The reason was that the results of the discussion of the two Surabaya Gakkumdu Centers did not meet the elements of non-election criminal offenses," said Agil.

The 2020 Surabaya Pilkada was attended by Candidates for Mayor and Deputy Mayor of Surabaya, Eri Cahyadi and Armuji. The candidate pair number 01 was carried by PDI Perjuangan and supported by PSI. In addition, they also get additional strength from six non-parliamentary political parties, namely the Bulan Bintang Party (PBB), the Hanura Party, the Berkarya Party, PKPI, and the Garuda Party.

Meanwhile, the pair Machfud Arifin-Mujiaman with serial number 02 was carried by a coalition of eight parties, namely PKB, PPP, PAN, Golkar, Gerindra, PKS, Democrat and Nasdem Party and supported by a non-parliamentary party, namely the Perindo Party.