There Are Hundreds Of Casualties In Papua, But Not A Single Presidential Candidate Apologizes

JAKARTA - Entering the campaign period for the 2024 presidential election, the three candidate pairs, especially each presidential candidate, consistently continue to show their own image to attract voters. The founder of the Alvara Research Center, Hasanuddin Ali, revealed his analysis regarding the image of each presidential candidate using three dimensions, namely character, policy, and ideology.

This is because the three dimensions are considered to be the main preference when deciding to choose a candidate. First, about character. According to Hasan, in various surveys two images of leadership character are leaders who are strong / firm and leaders who are close to the people.

Second, the policy issue where the narrative that develops often leads to two major policies, namely continuing or changing President Joko Widodo's policies. Then the third dimension is about ideology, which in every presidential election is related to nationalist and Islamic ideologies.

Hasan explained that Ganjar Pranowo was very strong in image by the public as a presidential candidate who was close to the people. Ganjar is also considered to be continuing Jokowi's policy and nationalist ideology. Meanwhile, Prabowo Subianto by the public is very strong as a strong / firm leader. Similar to Ganjar, Prabowo is also imaged to continue Jokowi's policy and be nationalist with ideology.

Meanwhile, Anies Baswedan, by the public, is very strong as a presidential candidate who will make changes to Jokowi's policies and have Islamic ideology. In terms of leadership character, Anies Baswedan has no image, both firm and presidential candidates who are close to the people.

From the mapping of that position, Hasan continued, voters actually have their own perceptions in each candidate for the presidential candidate. Positioning or determining the candidate position is the best positioning that has the strongest distingsion.

"We can see that Ganjar and Anies have the most contrasting distingsion, especially regarding ideology and policy. In my opinion, each presidential candidate should prepare a different political marketing strategy for the first round and the second round, if that happens. In addition, the mapping positioning of the presidential candidate also shows that the position of vice president is a very important determinant to fill the void in the image that is not owned by one of the presidential candidates," Hasan explained.

The Importance Of The Debate Of Ideas Between Candidates For Presidential And Vice Presidential Candidates

The head of the Political Department of CSIS, Arya Fernandes, assessed that the debate over the first presidential candidate to be held on December 12, was quite interesting and quite quality. The assessment is based on the first three things that have various variations of issues discussed by the candidates. Of course, with this variety of issues, it will be a reference for voters to compare programs from each pair of candidates.

"Secondly, the questions given by the panelists are sufficient to explain the current situation and strategic issues that can become a concern for the new government in the future. The issue that is noted is that there are the first three issues about conflict in Papua, issues of legal handling and corruption and issues related to human rights," he said. Arya Fernandes.

The tradition of the presidential debate in this nation is still relatively new. This nation has only started five rounds of debates which began in 2004, 2009, 2014, 2019 and 2024. However, the effect of debate in the two-round system will certainly have a strategic influence on voters.

"Influential to voters, it also consists of the first three factors with high voter volatility, both high swingvoters figures and based on the survey results in the last few months the swingvoter figure is still high between 20-25 percent. The reference for voters who are still swing is debate. And the third is the undecided voters (the indecisive voters) whose current figure is relatively small at 5-10 percent," he said.

"The debate effects in one round are indeed limited, but because currently the spin system is twice, the debate will have a strategic function," he added.

Researcher of the Department of Politics and Social Change from the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), D Nicky Fahrizal said the solution expressed by Prabowo Subianto regarding the increase in the judge's salary to ensure justice independence was considered ineffective. The quality of a judge is displayed when self-control in assessing the situation in order to maintain the integrity of a statesman.

Nicky also assessed that the vision of the state of law conveyed by presidential candidate number three Ganjar Pranowo was more complex because it presented policies that protect weak and marginal groups. Meanwhile, the vision conveyed by the presidential candidate with serial number one Anies Baswedan, is more inclined to emphasize civil liberties and the right to politics of citizens. On the other hand, the vision of the presidential candidate's legal state number 2, Prabowo Subianto, is considered less comprehensive.

Specifically for anti-corruption issues, Nicky assessed that the three presidential candidates have paid attention to the prevention and eradication of corruption. However, on the issue of confiscation of assets, there are differences of opinion.

"Anies and Ganjar consider the issue of confiscation of assets to be crucial for eradicating corruption, but Prabowo only discussed the commitment to eradicating corruption without being included in the substance of law enforcement," he said.

The complicated situation that occurred in Papua is also an issue discussed by the three panelists in the presidential candidate debate. The problems that occur in Papua are caused by people who are allowed to make interpretations, both individually and collectively, of the violent events that occur.

Senior Political Researcher Vidhyandika D. Perkasa assessed that the three presidential candidates in yesterday's debate were very unfortunate that they did not provide a specific answer and no one would apologize for the problems that occurred in Papua. Even though currently the conflict in Papua has claimed many lives.

"The three presidential candidates did not answer strategic questions but only conveyed normative answers. In addition, with the large number of victims of events in Papua, the three presidential candidates should have shown an apologetic attitude," he said.