KPU needs one voice to fend off political sharks

Ong Hock Chuan, Jakarta

The General Elections Commission (KPU) seems to have become a crisis-in-progress. It appears to have lost control of the situation. Disgruntled political parties called for the election results to be declared invalid, though later they said these were only the statements of their individual leaders.

Information technology experts are having a field day blaming the KPU and everyone else with their I-told-you-so admonishments. Even State Minister for Information and Communications Syamsul Mu'arif has weighed in, saying that the KPU's computerized vote counting system -- though which by law will not be the basis of the official results -- has given IT a bad name.

If the pressure amounts to KPU having to declare the results of the legislative election invalid, such a scenario would be unfortunate to Indonesia's development, both economically and politically. It would represent a backward step for all the progress Indonesia has made toward becoming a more stable democracy.

The KPU should not let this happen and the way they can do this is by managing their communications better. They should start off by defining three key messages that they should deliver at every occasion and media engagement, until the messages sink into the minds of every politician, observer and member of the public.

The first is that the KPU may have made many mistakes, but it also achieved much. In spite of everything, it managed to hold the elections on time. This is no small achievement given the geographic spread and size of the voting population.

The second message that the KPU should hammer on is that it would be naive for anyone not to expect any irregularities in an election as complex as this one.

With some 147 million voters in large cities as well as remote villages casting their votes for not one, but four tiers of political office, some degree of irregularity is to be expected.

No one has yet to make a strong argument that the degree of irregularity is beyond acceptable levels. International observers, who have had much experience studying elections in many countries and under varying conditions, have certainly not lodged any strong protests against the overall staging of the general election. Therefore, there is no basis to call for a revote on the basis of irregularities.

KPU's third key message should be to reiterate that its computerized voting system was meant only to provide an indication of voting trends, not the legal results, so there is no basis for the political parties to call for a revote based on the reliability of the computerized voting results. The election law clearly stipulates that only manually counted voting results will be officially recognized.

If the KPU decides on these key messages then the next step it should take is to ensure they do not shoot themselves in the foot by muddling the delivery. The KPU has consistently been doing this. On any given day three or more spokespersons are quoted by the media, often delivering messages that contradict each other.

An example was KPU member Chusnul Mar'iyah reaffirming on the eve of the elections that the results would be delivered nine hours after the polling closed. At the same time, a KPU IT team member raised doubts over the caliber of data input officers in the provinces.

Instances like this only give the impression that the KPU is confused, divided and is not in charge. It also sends the message to political parties that the KPU is weak. Weakness in politics has the same allure as the smell of blood to sharks.

What the KPU can do is appoint one person to be the KPU's spokesperson and channel all preagreed messages through him or her. This spokesperson should be trained to be on message even when dealing with the most aggressive journalists. Everyone else in the KPU would just have to shut up, no matter how large their egos.

It is only by such a disciplined approach to communications that the KPU can regain control of the situation and move Indonesia's march toward democracy forward. Failure to manage its communications well would make it easy for political parties to push for a revote, which would benefit no one in Indonesia.

The writer works at Maverick, a public relations consultancy specializing in crisis and issues management and brand communications.