Successfully Prevented, Apparently Stickers In Rice Distributed To Tanjungpinang Residents With Pictures Of Cakada Lis Darmansyah

Chairman of the Tanjungpinang City Bawaslu Muhammad Yusuf. (ANTARA/Ogen)

TANJNGPINANG - Bawaslu Tanjungpinang City, Riau Islands (Kepri) succeeded in preventing rice distribution action with stickers from one of the local regional head candidates (Cakada) in the middle of the 2024 regional election campaign.

The head of the Tanjungpinang Bawaslu Muhammad Yusuf explained that the incident took place on Friday, October 4, at around 18.50 WIB when the Senggarang Village/Village Election Supervisor (PKD) received information from the public that there would be a food distribution activity planned for Saturday, at around 09.00 WIB at a coffee shop in the local village.

"As a precautionary measure, Saturday morning, our supervisors carried out surveillance around the informed coffee shop area," Yusuf said in Tanjungpinang, as reported by Antara, Tuesday, October 8.

From PKD's observations in the field, he said, it was found that a shop owner delivered a number of packaged rice bags at a coffee shop in Pelatar Senggarang.

When asked by PKD, the shop owner concerned admitted that the rice was ordered by someone to be delivered to the coffee shop.

Shortly thereafter, PKD reported the incident to Panwaslu, Tanjungpinang Kota District and forwarded to Bawaslu Tanjungpinang. The head of Bawaslu Yusuf and his ranks immediately went down to and arrived at the location around 09.00 WIB.

"Arriving there, 140 bags of rice were found piled up in one corner of the coffee shop and most of them were stickerd by one of the candidates for the Mayor of Tanjungpinang (Lis Darmansyah)," said Yusuf.

Before sliding to the location, Yusuf said, his party had coordinated with the Riau Islands Provincial Bawaslu and was asked to secure the rice. His party also asked for information from the owner of the shop and the coffee shop, but they did not know about the rice distribution event.

"They only know that there is an invitation from the mouth to the mouth that there will be distribution of basic necessities (rice) here," said Yusuf.

Then around 10.00 WIB, the person in charge of the event as well as the Chairperson of the Riau Islands Student Leadership Forum, Edo Andrean Saputra, was present at the location and explained that they were volunteers for the mayor Lis Darmansyah who lived in Batam.

To Bawaslu, they explained that they would hold social activities to distribute basic necessities to the people of Senggarang. Bawaslu then reprimanded the person concerned that distributing basic necessities with a sticker attached to one of the mayorial candidates was a prohibited act during the campaign period, as regulated in PKPU Number 13 of 2024 concerning the 2024 Pilkada Campaign.

"They admit that they don't know that this is not allowed. They haven't even read and don't know about the PKPU 13 of 2024," explained Yusuf.

When asked where the rice came from, Yusuf continued, the Chairperson of the Edo Forum submitted a proposal for activities to donors who were also advisors to their forum, then agreed and directed to take rice in Senggarang.

On the same occasion, Bawaslu also contacted the winning team and the LO candidate pair number two Lis Darmansyah-Raja Ariza to ask about the distribution of the basic necessities. However, they admitted that they did not know anything about these activities.

"On schedule, the candidate pair number two campaign in Singgarang will be held Monday (7/10)," said Yusuf.

At that time, he continued, Bawaslu Tanjungpinang decided to temporarily secure the rice as a maximum prevention effort by his staff.

Later, Bawaslu Tanjungpinang held a plenary meeting and agreed that the rice must be returned, because the rice is not evidence of a criminal offense that must be confiscated, especially preventive measures have been made.

Yusuf also asked the Chairperson and Management of the Riau Islands Student Leadership Forum to be present along with his donors at the time of returning the rice in order to get education about the ban on campaigning, and promised not to do the same.

"But if one of them is not present, we agree to postpone the return of the rice until an undetermined time," said Yusuf.