Monitoring teams focus on education voters

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.