Monitoring teams focus on education voters

Abdul Khalik, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Most monitoring teams appear to have focused their programs on educating voters and getting them to the polls for the April 5 legislative election, instead of putting their weight behind the 22-day campaign period.

There are 28 monitoring teams registered with the General Elections Commission, of which 23 are local and five are foreign.

The first five days of the campaign period, during which many monitoring teams were late or failed to show up at indoor campaigns, seem to indicate this shift in focus.

For example, Friday's campaign by the Crescent Star Party (PBB) at the Rawamangun Youth Center, East Jakarta, was attended by only two activists from the Independent Election Monitoring Committee, while no activists from monitoring teams were seen during Monday's National Mandate Party (PAN) campaign at the Jatinegara Youth Center, also in East Jakarta.

"I don't see anybody from the monitoring team. They also came late yesterday when the United Development Party (PPP) held its campaign in this building," said a Jatinegara district official on the sidelines of PAN's campaign.

Chairman of the Election Monitoring Committee for the Poor Muhammad Lukman acknowledged that its monitoring team was placing more priority on election day than on the campaigns.

"We are targeting poor people in the rural as well as urban areas, educating them on how to exercise their voting rights. Currently, we are teaching this marginalized section how to vote, because many of them are as yet unfamiliar with the procedures," he told The Jakarta Post.

He added that approximately 60 million poor voters were unaware of the importance of their rights in relation to determining the fate of the nation and their own future.

Another registered monitoring team, the Independent Workers Election Committee is focusing on how to prevent workers from being manipulated by their employers during the election.

"We don't really care about the campaign period. What we are doing now is trying to prevent candidates from the business sector from forcing their workers to vote for them," said committee secretary-general Idrus.

He said many businesspeople were either candidates for the House of Representatives or the Regional Representatives Council.

"We are afraid that such people will use their power as employers to force their workers to vote for them. We believe these workers must have the independence to vote for whomever they like," he added.