71 election workers died from exhaustion in Indonesia amid last week’s polls, while some 4,000 fell sick

Some 4,000 others fell sick between February 14 and February 18 due to fatigue after helping run the February 14 election, Hasyim Asy’ari, chairman of the nation’s poll body said in a press conference in Jakarta on Monday.

Five million paid volunteers worked at 800,000 voting booths across the nation in last week’s voting that lasted about six hours. More than 200 million citizens were registered to cast their ballots to elect a president, vice-president and legislators on the national and local levels.

Running a voting process in Indonesia requires working around the clock to distribute, count and report hundreds of paper ballots that could last more than 12 hours after polling booths close.

Defence Minister Prabowo Subianto has declared victory in the presidential race, citing the unofficial results of multiple quick counts. The official results will be announced by March 20.