One Month For Pilkada Campaign, Online Campaign Usage Decreased

Bawaslu Building (Irfan Meidianto / VOI)

JAKARTA - Member of the Election Supervisory Agency (Bawaslu) Mochammad Afifuddin said the 2020 Pilkada online campaign tended to decline during the campaign period during the past month.

Based on the results of Bawaslu supervision in 270 regions that held the 2020 Pilkada, there were only 80 online campaigns conducted on the third 10 days of the campaign or on 16 to 25 October.

The number of online campaigns has decreased compared to the second 10 days of the campaign, or the 6-15 October period with 98 online campaign activities.

"The decline in the number of online campaigns illustrates that this method is not the main activity prioritized by candidate pairs and campaign teams as a form of activity to communicate with voters," Afif told reporters, Wednesday, October 28.

Bawaslu's analysis shows that the lack of interest in candidate pairs or campaign teams online is allegedly due to their unpreparedness to use online tools.

The online method is also considered unable to be a communicative dialogue space so that it is considered ineffective in conveying the vision, mission, programs and messages to influence voter preferences.

"This means that efforts to encourage an increase in online campaigns through both online and social media have not yielded maximum results. In fact, this method is expected to be used the most considering the COVID-19 pandemic," said Afif.

Meanwhile, said Afif, campaigns with face-to-face methods and / or limited meetings were still the most frequently carried out. In fact, candidate pairs and campaign teams know that this activity is in the midst of the threat of COVID-19 transmission.

For information, the General Election Commission issued KPU Regulation (PKPU) Number 13 of 2020 as an amendment to PKPU Number 6 of 2020 regarding the implementation of regional elections during a pandemic.

In Article 58 PKPU herein, political parties, candidate pairs and campaign teams prioritize limited campaign methods provided they are inside the building and limit the number of participants to a maximum of 50 people.

Meanwhile, Article 63 states that other activities that do not violate campaign prohibitions and the provisions of laws and regulations are carried out in the form of campaigns through social media and online media.

The lightest sanction that can be imposed for violators of health protocols in PKPU 13/2020 is a written warning from Bawaslu.

In addition, there are other sanctions in the form of terminating and forcibly dissolving the campaign at the place where the violation occurred if it does not immediately disband within one hour of being warned.

The heaviest sanction is the prohibition of conducting campaign methods that are violated for 3 days based on the recommendation of the provincial Bawaslu or district / city Bawaslu