Necessary For The Fair Value Of The Election Budget To Increase To Rp. 76 T, But Must Be Transparent

JAKARTA - The Association for Elections and Democracy (Perludem) considers the 2024 election budget to be fair as agreed at Rp.

"Increasing the election budget is something that is natural. Besides we are not completely free from the pandemic, there is also an adjustment to the honorarium of KPPS officers that needs to be done as a tribute to their very heavy workload," said Titi Anggraini, a member of the Supervisory Board of Needdem in Jakarta, Wednesday, 18 May.

According to him, there is a lot of encouragement to make elections easier and simpler. "It turns out that innovation efforts towards that direction also require substantial financial support," he continued. According to Titi, the election must be financed with a proper budget in order to create a quality administration. He was also reasonable if previously the budget was considered too large.

"Indeed, there are many public comments highlighting the increase in the 2024 election budget which is considered very large, without knowing the allocation and distribution of the budget. But the election must be financed with a proper and adequate budget so that the implementation can be of the quality as expected," he explained.

Therefore, Titi asked the election organizers to be more open to the public regarding the use of these funds. Thus, the public can be sure that the election budget is used credibly by the KPU.

"The public funds used also need to be managed in an open, transparent and accountable manner. So far, the public has not been well explained about the budget allocation and its relevance, so the focus is more on large budget amounts," he said. It is known, Commission II of the DPR in charge of election affairs, the government, and the General Elections Commission (KPU) agreed on the 2024 election budget of Rp. 76 trillion. The agreement was taken by the DPR, the government, and the KPU in a consignment meeting during the recess, last Friday, May 13.

"It was agreed that according to the budget proposal from the KPU according to stages, a total of Rp. 76,656,312,294,000," said Deputy Chairman of Commission II of the DPR from the PDI-P faction, Junimart Girsang, Sunday, May 15.

Junimart revealed that the 2024 election budget was disbursed in stages. He detailed that the budget was disbursed as much as Rp. 8 trillion this year. Meanwhile, in 2023, the budget disbursed is Rp. 23 trillion, while in 2024 it is Rp. 44 trillion.

"In 2022 it will be IDR 8,061,085,734,000, in 2023 it will be IDR 23,857,317,226,000, in 2024 it will be IDR 44,737,909,334,000," explained Junimart.