JEDDAH, 7 July 2004 — Voter turnout among overseas Indonesians for their presidential elections was minimal. Of the 38,970 overseas registered voters in the Kingdom, only 7,387 voted in the elections on Monday, according to Sabilillah Maqom of the Indonesian Consulate here.
“The low number is due to the fact that thousands of Indonesians have gone home on vacation,” Maqom told Arab News yesterday. “There was very good cooperation from businesses. They provided facilities to their personnel to exercise their franchise,” he added.
However, the bulk of Indonesians in the Kingdom are domestic workers, many of them going on vacation only once every two or three years.
Maqom said the highest number of votes — 2,440 — went to Amien Rais, followed by Gen. Wiranto (1,828), Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (1,417), Megawati Sukarnoputri (1,247), and Hamzah Haz (455).
