Religious platforms no sure bet at the polls

The Jakarta Post ,  Jakarta   |  Thu, 06/29/2006 4:24 PM

Hera Diani, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Religious-oriented platforms have proven ineffective for Islamic parties in election bids unless they branched out to form coalitions with nationalist parties, a survey shows.

Research by the Electoral Education Network for People (JPPR) during 2005's regional elections revealed that candidates from either an Islamic party or a coalition of Islamic parties only succeeded in 17 regions of the total of 224 regions, or 7.48 percent.

They received strong support in Tasikmalaya and Depok in West Java, Bengkulu province, Bukittinggi in West Sumatra, Situbondo in East Java and Ponuwato in Gorontalo.

However, when Islamic parties merged with nationalist parties, their candidates won in 83 regions (37.05 percent). The rest of the regions picked candidates from nationalist parties (73 regions/32.59 percent) or their coalitions (51 regions/22.27 percent).

The research also showed that in the first direct regional election in June last year, incumbent leaders won out in 124 regions of 210 regions they contested, or 59.05 percent.

""Incumbent leaders can still use their powers to influence bureaucrats and the public. However, this does not always work unless their leadership have proven successful. It's good because that means people are aware of their leaders' performance,"" said JPPR coordinator Adung Rochman in a seminar Wednesday.

Other findings included that money politics remained rampant in the elections as well as other violations, such as candidates' providing fake academic credentials and voter fraud. However, assumptions that rich candidates or those from large parties were assured of victory proved false.

Political scientist Syamsuddin Harris from the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI) said that people favored popular figures, regardless of whether they represented a major party.

""Candidates with loads of money did not necessarily win, like in West Sumatra province. Golkar party also missed its initial target of 60 percent by winning only 35.5 percent, in only six regions in Java,"" he said.

The trends, he added, showed that big parties did not have strong roots in the regions.

""Coalitions between parties were hardly based on the same ideology or vision except for money and power. They only cooperated to share the power pie. There was no effort whatsoever to prepare quality candidate or cadres,"" Syamsuddin said.

Another concern was the low participation of women candidates, with a total of 81 candidates competing in 63 regions, and only 19 winning.

Among the winners was Rustriningsih, an incumbent regent of Kebumen in Central Java, who grabbed 77 percent of the vote. This number was the highest in the election as the majority (66.81 percent) of regional leaders received 50 percent or less.

Adung said the 30 percent quota for women candidates was not implemented well due to the lack of a clearly defined and feasible system.

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