President Yudhoyono Urges Indonesians To Vote

Jakarta, April 9 (Antara) - President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has urged Indonesian people to exercise their rights to vote in the ongoing parliamentary elections being held simultaneously across the country, on Wednesday. "I call upon all citizens who are eligible voters, to use their rights as best as they can in this legislative election 2014," President Yudhoyono tweeted on Wednesday. Eligible voters should go to polling booths and cast their votes for members of legislature, he wrote on his Twitter (@SBYudhoyono). "The 2004 and 2009 general elections ran smoothly, and Insya Allah (God Willing), the general elections 2014 will run better," he promised. According to him, the nation has progressed a lot under his administration over the past ten years, despite some problems that need to be resolved yet. "The task and responsibility of the future leaders and government are to maintain and continue the good things, and improve the minus ones," he explained. He proclaimed that he prayed for leaders and legislators so they could carry out the people`s mandate properly. "Hopefully, the future leaders will also love the people sincerely, and work hard for their welfare," he declared. "Congratulations for those exercising their rights to vote on April 9, 2014, Good bless you Indonesia," he wrote. Indonesians cast their votes in parliamentary elections held simultaneously across the nation, which is the biggest democracy after India and the United States, on Wednesday. More than 185.8 million voters, spread across thousands of islands that stretch some 4.8 thousand km from east to west, are registered to vote in the largest and most complicated single-day poll in the world. There are more than 545 thousand polling booths, which open at 7 a.m. and close at 1 p.m. across the world`s largest archipelago country. This year, 15 political parties, of which 12 are national and three are local, are participating in the elections. In the parliamentary elections, some 6,607 candidates were contesting for 560 seats in the House of Representatives (DPR). In addition, there will be elections to 132 seats of the Regional Representatives Council (DPD) at the national level, 2,112 of the provincial parliamentary (DPRD I) seats and 16,895 seats for the district/municipality-level legislative assemblies (DPRD II). Results of the parliamentary elections are due on May 7 and 9.