Expert: Presidential And Vice Presidential Candidates Must Leave Gaming To Get Young Voters

Political science expert at Padjadjaran University, Caroline Paskarina, said that the three pairs of presidential and vice presidential candidates (candidates and vice presidents) must get out of the games and prioritize real programs to attract novice voters or young voters.

"A number of researches on the preferences of novice or young voters show their hope for the presence of leaders who should be imitated, legal certainty, eradicating corruption, (as well as) handling economic problems thoroughly which need to be answered by realistic programs from each pair of candidates," Caroline said when contacted from Jakarta, Tuesday, December 26.

Caroline said political games can also backfire for presidential and vice-presidential candidates because they can lead to antipathy from young or novice voters.

"Prospective pairs need to get out of the games that can backfire because of the antipathy of young voters or beginners," said Caroline.

Of the two presidential and vice presidential debates that have been held by the General Election Commission (KPU) of the Republic of Indonesia on Tuesday (12/12) and Friday (22/12), according to Caroline, consistency on the issues raised still needs to be balanced.

"The three pairs of candidates have tried to raise issues that are popular among young or beginner voters, but need to be balanced with consistency in voicing these issues," he said.

Until now, said Caroline, public talks about the three pairs of presidential and vice-presidential candidates are still limited to popular jargon.

"As of the 28 days of the campaign period (25/12), it seems that the presentation of the vision and mission that is the flagship of the three pairs of candidates has not yet fully become the subject of public attention. Public discussion is still limited to popular jargons, such as sleptet, SGIE, gemoy, sulfate acid, and the like," said Caroline.

However, he said that each presidential and vice presidential candidate had optimized a campaign period of 28 days to strengthen support to areas that became the mass base of supporting parties for candidate pairs.

The Indonesian KPU has determined three pairs of presidential and vice presidential candidates to participate in the 2024 presidential election. The results of the draw and determination of the serial number of participants in the 2024 presidential election determined the Anies Baswedan-Muhaimin Iskandar pair number 1, Prabowo Subianto-Gibran Rakabuming Raka number 2, and Ganjar Pranowo-Mahfud Md. serial number 3.

The KPU has also set a campaign period from November 28, 2023 to February 10, 2024, while the voting schedule is on February 14, 2024.