53% of potential voters don't know election date

53% of potential voters don't know election date

Moch. N. Kurniawan and Bambang Nurbianto, The Jakarta Post,
Jakarta

Just 30 days ahead of the April 5 legislative election, only 47
percent of the country's population is actually aware of that
date, according to a survey by the International Foundation for
Election System (IFES) and the Polling Center.

The survey, published on Friday, revealed that of the 53
percent who did not know the date, 28 percent had no idea, 14
percent gave the wrong answer and 11 percent knew there would be
an election but did not know when.

The survey polled people from all 32 provinces with 1,000
respondents interviewed from Jan. 26 to Feb. 1 and 1,000 others
from Feb. 1 to Feb. 6.

"That survey, however, has yet to consider the impact of the
new advertisements, with info about the dates for both
legislative and presidential elections. The ad was launched in
mid-February," explained General Elections Commission (KPU)
member Valina Singka Subekti.

The survey, presented by Polling Center Managing Director
Yanti B. Sugarda, said that 60 percent of respondents simply
punched their favorite political parties and only 19 percent
punched both the party and the individual candidates in the
legislative election.

It also said 45 percent of respondents already knew about the
Regional Representative Council (DPD).

Public ignorance was also reflected in the 20 simulations held
in Jakarta since Jan. 13. Evaluations from those simulations,
focusing on poorly educated voters, showed that 20 percent of the
voters failed to cast the votes properly.

Member of the Jakarta General Election Commission (KPUD), Juri
Ardiantoro, said would-be voters were still confused with the
ballot paper's new forms, which were completely different from
the old ones.

The size of the ballot papers are much larger as now they
carry symbols of 24 parties and photographs of all legislative
candidates. In the 1999 election, the ballot papers only had the
symbols of 48 participating political parties.

"We always explain to the people how to vote properly before
simulations, but they still make mistakes," he said.

Most of the mistakes were because people only punched
legislative candidates photographs or they punched political
party symbols and then candidates from different parties. Some of
them did not punch anything on their ballot papers.

The general elections law stipulates that voting will be valid
only if a voter punches a party symbol or both the party and its
legislative candidate's photograph.

Juri said KPUD also organized simulations in the city's 262
subdistricts since Feb. 21 and the result showed that the mistake
level was only 5 percent. However, he admitted that the
simulations in subdistrict offices would reflect a readiness of
the election organizers instead of the voters understanding on
the voting procedures.