Non-voting is no problem for govt: Analysts

Non-voting is no problem for govt: Analysts

JAKARTA (JP): The government need not worry about people
abstaining from voting tomorrow because it is common in
democracies, two political analysts said yesterday.

J. Kristiadi of the Centre for Strategic and International
Studies (CSIS) was quoted by Antara as saying: "In Indonesia,
where the political system adheres to Pancasila Democracy, the
Golput (non-voter) phenomenon is something the government should
not fear.

"Also, the government has explicitly reiterated that people's
participation in the election is a right, not an obligation."

Deputy chairman of the National Commission on Human Rights,
Marzuki Darusman, said non-voters were common in democracies.

"It's only that the government has been overwhelmed with its
duty to make the general election a success, in which a criteria
of success is the number of people using their voting rights,"
Marzuki said.

Public debate on non-voting has intensified since the ousted
leader of the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI), Megawati
Soekarnoputri, declared last week she would keep her yellow
registration card and abstain from voting. Many analysts believe
this will increase the Golput vote this year.

Golput, an acronym for Golongan Putih (White Group), refers to
people who avoid polling booths or spoil their ballot papers to
protest the political system.

Megawati's supporters in Salatiga, Banyumas, Kebumen,
Purworejo, Cilacap and Purbalingga in Central Java have declared
they will follow her example.

Nine youth and student organizations and pro-Megawati
activists in Surabaya announced yesterday they would not vote
because the government had designed the election to maintain the
status quo.

The organizations include the Nationalist Student Movement's
Surabaya chapter, the Teachers' Training and Education
Institute's senate and the Christian Students' Movement.

Under the Indonesian laws, voting is not obligatory but
instigating people into boycotting a general election is liable
to prosecution.

The government has repeatedly urged eligible citizens to vote
otherwise they would spoil their basic political rights.

Kristiadi said that Golput had never exceeded 10 percent of
the vote.

"Say, this year's Golput reaches 15 percent, what could they
do?" he said, comparing it to the percentage of non-voters in the
United States that could reach between 40 percent and 50 percent.

In a "political power context,", Kristiadi said, non-voters
meant nothing to the New Order government that has been ruling
for more than 30 years.

But Kristiadi said the government should be wary of non-voting
if it reflected growing discontent on its "blatant deviations".

He said non-voting was no longer an urban phenomenon because
rural people had slowly been learning about politics and non-
voting.

"It's just that there have been no guarantees that their
knowledge of Golput will make them practice it, because there's
still a kind of mass fear in the air," he said. (aan/wah/nur)