Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Mackellar, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Seniors) Share this | Hansard source

I join the delegation and rise to speak in support of the remarks by the leader of the delegation.

I attended the Indonesian part only, and I believe it was an important part of the ongoing relationship between Australia and Indonesia. The delegation had the opportunity for high-level meetings, including with the vice-president, and opportunities to meet with Indonesian people to learn of their experience of their country's move to democracy.

It is interesting in a country which of course does not have compulsory voting, that 62 per cent turned out for this mayoral election which we visited. Of the 322,000-odd eligible voters some 200,000 of them turned out to vote. This was a rise in participation compared to the 2006 poll, where only 53 per cent of registered voters cast a vote. Generally in Indonesia voter turnout has been exceptionally high in recent years, but is now appearing to drop. It was suggested to the delegation that this could be an indication of voter fatigue due to the high number of elections in the country. For example, in 2010 there were more than 240 local elections conducted.

There was an expectation that it would be an outright win for the pair who eventually won. That was the pair supported by Golkar and the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle, but they only achieved 48.3 per cent of the vote on polling day. Rather than have a run-off there was a subdistrict approach applied. This means that the total votes of the subdistrict are examined and the candidate to win the most subdistrict elections are declared the winners—that is, for mayor and deputy mayor. So the final winners of the election, declared some 10 days after the election was held, were in fact the pair supported by Golkar and the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle.

It was interesting to watch the people line up to cast their votes. They were obviously very keen to be part of the process. It is interesting that the mark that you have voted is that your little pinky finger is dipped in ink, and that is to ensure that you are not voting a second time. It might be something that we could look at here; we do have a few people who vote more than once.

The AEC noted that their permanent presence in Jakarta has been a very positive presence. We now have an Australian Electoral Commission director and local staff, and they work together with AusAID representatives. They accompanied us around the polling stations during the voting, and at the close of the polling booths and the beginning of the count. It was interesting to see them hold up the ballot boxes. There was obviously pride taken in making sure that there was not double voting and that there was no tampering with those ballot boxes.

The AEC, in partnership with AusAID, have been working hard to build strong relationships with electoral authorities in Indonesia. Observing the Yogyakarta mayoral election was a valuable opportunity to see Australia's continuing electoral support being given to Indonesia, which was begun by the Howard government, and why it is so important. Australia provides direct support, and through international partnerships, to develop the capacity of Indonesia's electoral authorities.

I, too, would like to thank Samantha Mannette, who acted as the secretary to the committee during the visit. Her attention to detail and organising of the trip was exemplary. I think it was a useful part in continuing the important relationship between Australia and Indonesia.

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