E-Voting Can Reduce Money Politics in the Pilkada
UPI Political Science Professor Cecep Darmawan assessed that the implementation of an e-voting system could reduce the prevalence of money politics, which is already acute in the implementation of direct regional head elections (pilkada).
"Money politics is the enemy of democracy, the enemy of us all. Then if the implementation of elections is expensive in all kinds of ways, including logistics, do e-voting, it's not a hassle," he said, Sunday, January 18.
According to him, concerns about e-voting being vulnerable to hacking threats are not an excuse to back down. Instead, it is a challenge for the government to strengthen the security of the system, by working seriously and involving competent experts.
"How do you do it? Gather experts, I'm sure it can be done, if we are serious about it. Because the most important thing is that sovereignty is in the hands of the people, political rights are in the hands of the people," he continued.
Cecep revealed that the government could learn from other countries and even borrow expertise from outside if the expertise in the country was still considered limited. "It's still not (there) experts, experts from outside for example, it's okay. And also look at countries that can e-vote like that. It's actually simple," he added.
On the other hand, he reminded that the root of the political money problem is not only in the election system.
Because, transactional practices are now more expensive considering that the circulating money is directly in the community, not just the elite and parties like the previous era.
Therefore, what must be built is high literacy and political awareness, not changing the system from direct to indirect elections.
"People are not easily tempted by envelopes, while candidates and successful teams stop giving cash rewards for votes. If the candidate is a member of the DPR, then the election teams should also not play money, all compact, most likely there will be no money politics," concluded Cecep.