Campaigning amid the Epidemic
The 2020 election campaign period will be held for 71 days, starting on 26 September and ending on 5 December.
Motorcycle riders crossed the mural of the Anti Sara campaign in the General Election depicted on the wall of the Upper Hamlet area, Jakarta, Friday (19/6/2020).
The 2020 election campaign period will be held for 71 days, starting on 26 September and ending on 5 December. The time span will become the spring of political image building in 270 regions that hold regional elections.
The implementation of regional elections in the epidemic should be managed not just by trial and error. The stakes are human life and public health amid the euphoria of political images. Do not let the local elections create a new cluster for the spread of Covid-19.
There are two dimensions that must be united to strengthen one another, namely public awareness and certainty in the form of policies that can guide behavior in the implementation of the regional elections.
Modification of campaigns
Campaigning is an important activity because it is an opportunity for self-introduction and to present visions and missions, as well as a public test for the capacity of candidates.
In an academic perspective, referring to Roger and Storey in his book, Communication Campaign (1987), a campaign is defined as a series of planned communication actions and aims to create certain effects on a large number of audiences that are carried out sustainably over a certain period of time. Practically, this time limitation issue is also emphasized during the electoral contestation period, such as the regional elections or the presidential election. The General Elections Commission (KPU) sets the campaign period for the 2020 regional elections for 71 days. This timeframe is shorter than the 2015 regional elections of 81 days and the 2019 simultaneous elections, which took place from 23 September 2018 to 13 April 2019.
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Of course, the election campaign in the upcoming regional elections must make the endemic variable in the first place. For the KPU, there is no other choice but to be serious about the details of the campaign implementation with health protocols. Meanwhile, the parties that will be campaigning, both the candidate pair and the success team, must be disciplined with the rules and jointly build awareness to take care for the mitigation of Covid-19 in the midst of implementing a variety of ways to persuade the voter base.
Thus, the campaign is expected to be part of the solution, not the other way round making the problem even more out of control.
The campaign must be based on the identification of problems, especially now when many affected people need support in health, economic and social aspects. A practitioner who is also a campaign scientist, Leon Ostergaard, as quoted by Hans-Dieter Klingemann, Public Information Campaigns and Opinion Research (2002), underlines the importance of the campaign process that begins with research into problem identification and ends with a real offer to reduce the problems. Thus, the campaign is expected to be part of the solution, not the other way round making the problem even more out of control.
We can learn from South Korea and Singapore, which were relatively successful in holding elections in the Covid-19 endemic season. The Republic of Korea National Election Commission (South Korean KPU) held elections to elect 300 members of the national legislature on 15 April 2020.
In terms of voter participation it was quite good, even becoming the best achievement in the last 20 years of elections in South Korea with 66.2 percent or more than 28 million voters exercising their voting rights. In terms of the endemic, it should also be appreciated because within the 14-day period of virus incubation from voting day, there were no new cases of Covid-19.
Of course, many factors enabled South Korea to successfully hold elections in the endemic season. One of the determining factors is the modification of campaign methods. The organizer optimized online the campaigns. The online-based campaign method optimized the variety of creative and multimedia content. This matter succeeded in suppressing not too many crowds of citizens who could potentially spread the virus. If in the previous elections the campaigns in the online media were as a complement, in the endemic season became the main campaign method.
Chairman of the Election Oversight Body (Bawaslu) Abhan (left) with the Secretary General of the Ministry of Health (Kemenkes) Oscar Primadi (right) exchange souvenirs after signing a memorandum of understanding (MoU) at the Bawaslu Office, Jakarta, Tuesday (21/7/2020), related to examination support health for the election supervisory committee (Panwaslu) in the sub-district, kelurahan / village, and the Polling Station Supervisor (PTPS) in the simultaneous elections of the 2020 elections.
The modification of the campaign method was also carried out in the Singapore elections which had conducted the elections on 10 July. The grand campaign was firmly and clearly abolished to anticipate the spread of the endemic. Parliamentary candidates were encouraged to hold online campaigns via live streaming. Another interesting thing was that political parties were allocated more time to convey their programs and vision and mission through national television channels. Candidates were indeed still allowed to communicate with citizens in a door-to-door as long as they comply with regulations which allowed the gathering of a maximum of five people in the second phase towards a new normalcy.
Improvement of the mechanism
KPU Regulation No. 6 of 2020 concerning simultaneous local elections in the condition of the Covid-19 non-natural disaster set on 6 July still needs to be improved in many ways, especially because it does not yet reflect policies that support the mitigation of Covid-19 in the implementation of the campaigns.
The KPU must issue specific regulations regarding the organization of campaigns so that they are clearer, operational and implementable in accordance with the health protocol. There are several important notes as input for the KPU.
First, concerning the campaign method that will be used. In Chapter VI Article 57 of KPU Regulation (PKPU) No. 6/2020 it is said that there are seven campaign methods, namely limited meetings, face-to-face meetings and dialogues, public debates and open debates among the pairs of candidates, dissemination of campaign materials to the public, installation of props, display of campaign advertisements in print and electronic mass media, and other activities that do not violate campaign prohibitions and statutory provisions.
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The shortcomings, it should be added explicitly with the campaign method on social media so that there are clear rules that will guide the campaign through social media.
The rules of the game must be clear, detailed, and provide certainty so that it also makes it easier for the Election Supervision Agency (Bawaslu) and the public to jointly supervise its implementation. The KPU should encourage this campaign through social media as one of the main methods not as complementary, as in South Korea and Singapore.
The current era, often called by Blumler and Kavanagh in the book of Ian Ward and James Cahill, Old and New Media: Blogs in The Third Age of Political Communication (2009), is the third generation of political communication after the rhetoric era and the mainstream media era. An era which is marked by abundance of information with multimedia and interactive communication characteristics will overflow in the 2020 regional elections.
More than that, joint sports and bazaars are still permitted. Such activities are certainly commonplace if the regional elections are held in the normal season.
Second, in Article 63 PKPU No. 60 concerning other activities that do not violate the campaign prohibition and the provisions of the legislation as referred to in Article 57 Letter g still includes large crowds of citizens because they still allow public meetings, cultural activities such as art performances, grand harvesting, even music concerts. More than that, joint sports and bazaars are still permitted. Such activities are certainly commonplace if the regional elections are held in the normal season. Meanwhile the endemic still shows high numbers, all parties should be careful.
It is true that in 270 regions which will hold regional elections, it is impossible to only campaign through social media because internet access is still constrained in many regions. Therefore, offline campaign methods are still open, such as limited meetings, face-to-face meetings and dialogues, public debates, and others that can still be controlled with physical and social restrictions by the organizer.
Public meetings, music concerts, bazaars, and the like in practice will be very difficult to control, because the holding of such events often triggers mass hysteria. The KPU should firmly prohibit public meetings and other activities that risk on the spread of Covid-19.
Third, the KPU should open up campaign opportunities through advertising in the mass media and online media longer to replace the dissemination through public meetings and activities involving the masses, as was done in the elections in Singapore. All that remains is to set the mechanism so that it can continue to bring justice to all pairs of candidates who will be campaigning. For example, how many ad spots a day on television and radio media and the size and number of advertisements in print and online media. In particular, more detailed arrangements so that they do not overlap or collide with laws governing the media, such as the Broadcasting Law No. 32 of 2002.
Fourth, campaigns in the endemic season must also clarify more stringent and clearer sanctions for those who take advantage of the endemic mitigation financed from the State Budget (APBN), Regional Budget (APBD), or other public funds for their popularity as the pairs. For example, incumbent candidates who become the free riders of popularity through social assistance or distribution of stimulus funds to the general public on the basis of their constituencies.
The practice of utilizing this kind of publicity can be categorized as abuse of power and conflicts of interest.
The implementation of the regional elections must have clear and precise maps or zoning regarding Covid-19 vulnerability in the regions. This can be taken into consideration whether or not offline campaigns are held in a limited manner. Do not force tumultuous campaigns, but they are dangerous due to carelessness that is practiced together.
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Gun Gun Heryanto
Gun Gun Heryanto, Executive Director of The Political Literacy Institute, Political Communication Lecturer at UIN Jakarta, and Presidium of the Indonesian Political Communication Scientists Association (AIKPI)
