Does televised campaigning get the message across

Television stations broadcast every day staged sessions of debates and orations of political parties. The Jakarta Post correspondents M.M.I. Ahyani in Bandung, Asip Agus Hasani and Sri Wahyuni in Yogyakarta, Lourenco Vicente Martins in Dili, East Timor, Ainur R. Sophiaan in Surabaya, and reporter Sugianto Tandra in Jakarta ask whether this particular method of campaigning is effective.

JAKARTA (JP): A housewife in Bandung complained when her favorite TV program was cut short to make way for the airing of the so-called "dialog campaigns" involving representatives of three poll contestants at a time.

Each of the participants would first speak, before they shoot each other with questions. The audience would then also be given the chance to direct questions, which were obviously prearranged.

"I just don't get it. What are those parties saying? If this is a campaign, who watches it?" Linda Damayanti, 30, said, with obvious irritation at having to sacrifice her enjoyment for a "boring" show.

The 48 political parties contesting the June 7 polls were indeed given a short time to get their messages across and lure voters, and television campaigning is one of the ways to do this.

Another objective of the television campaigns is voter education, which is sorely needed, and is made difficult by the limited time and the vastness of the area that has to be reached.

Examples abound on the need for voter education. Political observer Eep Saefulloh Fatah recently told of his uncle, who said: "For Allah only, I will vote for party number two."

The uncle -- who witnessed elections under the New Order regime in which there were only three contestants and the ruling Golkar was No. 2 -- will get a big surprise when he realizes he will be voting for a Christian party, Eep explained recently in a workshop for political journalists here.

In the June 7 poll, the Indonesian Christian Party (Krisna) is placed at No. 2 among the 48 contestants.

Another case in point took place in a regency in East Java, when the National Awakening Party (PKB) held a voting simulation. Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) members, who said they would vote for PKB because they believed it was the only party for NU members, chose the Muslim Community Party (PKU) because its logo most resembled the NU logo.

Political observer Kastorius Sinaga believes in the effectiveness of electronic media, including television, in reaching the widest audience. "Even with limited resources, televisions can be used effectively," he said.

The question is: Is television campaigning, in the current format, also effective in getting the parties' messages across to the public?

Kastorius doubts this. "The campaigning is a form of monologue. The parties talk, without taking questions. It is just a show. Is the public willing to be duped?" he said.

He thinks the television campaigns have failed to establish emotional ties with the audience. "This form of campaigning may be effective for the upper middle class audience, who are used to being challenged to think. Remember, many of our voters vote irrationally," he said.

"There is another problem though. It is not certain that even the upper middle class people like to watch the campaigns." Kastorius admitted that he did not watch the program broadcast every day by all television stations here at different hours.

"I believe campaigning here must be geared so that it builds emotional ties," he said. "Maybe they should change the format, so the politicians featured are challenged more."

A waste

Communications expert and broadcaster Eduard Depari agreed the televised campaigns seem to have been ill-prepared. "There's something lacking in the presentation. It does not seem that there has been serious preparations for it... so viewers become bored and tired," he said.

"It's ineffective and such a waste of resources that could have been put to better use," he said. "Televised campaigning should be geared so it can net swinging voters.

"It would seem to me that only people who are already supporters of certain parties watch those sessions," said Eduard, who is also public relations officer with the RCTI television station.

Eduard also criticized the parties for addressing only issues that were already in the public's minds, rather than introducing new ideas.

"Campaigning is supposed to serve as a session of window shopping, arranged so a viewer's interests can be captured," he said. "Campaigning should be made so viewers vote for the parties."

Eduard, however, did not have any suggestions on how the televised campaigns could be made more interesting. "Well, I can't say how it can be made better. Maybe in 2004 can we find an interesting format, because the parties contesting the polls then would probably be reduced to only five or six parties."

"That way, the parties could really engage in debates," he said.

Survey Research Indonesia (SRI) promised to issue a rating of the televised campaigns next week.

"I believe it would be low, especially because it is aired at a time when not many potential voters watch," he said.

Interesting

Eduard believes televised election messages -- including one which features a Manado mother exhorting people to vote by saying "Inga, inga, badaftar rame-rame" (remember, remember, let's register for elections) -- were more interesting and better prepared.

Produced by Kelompok Visi Anak Bangsa and directed by popular film director Garin Nugroho, the messages are public service announcements that have been gaining popularity.

"Those messages teach people about democracy. But, can they eliminate public confusion?" he said. "Would their results justify the production costs? We don't know yet. Maybe after the elections."

"But I personally believe Garin's messages are too beautiful. They use nice pictures to the point were the messages are lost," he said.

As for campaign commercials produced by the political parties, Eduard said they were justified and contributed to TV stations' revenues. By how much? "We will have to wait until after the elections to find that out," he said.

"But if the parties want their commercials to be effective, they should limit them only to the leading figures (of the political parties), their symbols and numbers."

"I don't think we have time now to really disseminate parties' missions, platforms and other objectives," Eduard said.

Unpredictable

Meanwhile, Parni Hadi, secretary-general of the Indonesian Journalists Association (PWI), agreed that further studies are needed to determine the effectiveness of the televised campaigns.

"Maybe through polling? But of course they are still useful. If certain commercials (are bad, then they can serve) as negative campaigning, and push people away so they choose other parties.

"At the very least, we can see the quality of our leaders," he said.

Parni pointed out how unpredictable many things were in the election campaigns. He cited the recent televised debate between Attorney General Andi M. Ghalib and National Mandate Party (PAN) chairman Amien Rais.

"Ghalib benefited from the program. He was once portrayed as a coward, and yet he appeared for the debate, and people thought... 'Oh, Ghalib had enough guts to debate Amien Rais'," Parni said.

Parni said the media should not underestimate, or overestimate, the effectiveness of using all kinds of media for campaigning.