Rate of absenteeism in direct elections soars, scholar says

Masduki Attamami, Antara, Yogyakarta

Direct regional elections have taken place around the country, and despite some protests they have in general been orderly and peaceful.

However, some scholars have expressed concern over the high rate of poll absenteeism in some of the elections. In some areas, including Gunungkidul regency in Yogyakarta, the number of registered voters who failed to turn up at the polls was larger than the number of votes obtained by the winning candidates.

During the regency election several days ago in Gunungkidul, 128,743 eligible voters did not cast their votes, while the winning candidates Suharto and Badingah received 126,601 votes.

The rate of absenteeism was also high in Bantul and Sleman regencies, where 26 percent and 22.66 percent of eligible voters respectively did not cast ballots.

High rates of absenteeism are unfortunate because these direct elections are important in determining the futures of regions, said Sunardi, a senior lecturer at private Sanata Dharma University.

"Having more people engaged and voting in direct regional elections will help determine the fates of regions," said Sunardi.

Elected leaders will be less accountable to the public the fewer people vote in the elections, he said.

The fewer people who vote for leaders, the less indebted to the people these leaders will feel, making them less likely to serve the public's interests, he said.

He predicted that direct regional elections would continue to be plagued by high absentee rates because there were no laws requiring eligible voters to take part in the polls.

Sunardi said the media played a very important role in encouraging people to vote in direct elections in order to raise the quality of the elections.