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Calls mount for lower campaign spending cap

The government’s plan to cap campaign spending for candidates and parties contesting regional elections is too high, and will likely have no effect, as the proposed formula establishes no true spending limits

Hans Nicholas Jong (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Fri, March 20, 2015

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Calls mount for lower campaign spending cap

T

he government'€™s plan to cap campaign spending for candidates and parties contesting regional elections is too high, and will likely have no effect, as the proposed formula establishes no true spending limits.

The finding, released by election watchdog Association for Elections and Democracy (Perludem), was arrived at using a formula designed by the General Elections Commission (KPU) to establish region-specific budget ceilings.

Figures were calculated by dividing the number of eligible voters in one region by the number of regencies or municipalities within that region. The figure is then multiplied by the average cost of paying a civil servant to attend a full-day meeting in the region.

For example, West Java'€™s gubernatorial election budget-ceiling was Rp 490 billion (US$37.5 million) based on the average cost of holding a full-day meeting with Echelon I and II officials in the region, or Rp 345.6 billion if based on Echelon III standards.

'€œIn other words, the formula for the campaign budget cap set by the KPU is too high. It is as if there would be no limits imposed at all,'€ Perludem chairman Didik Supriyanto said on Thursday.

In the 2013 West Java gubernatorial election, the candidate pair of Ahmad '€œAher'€ Heryawan and Deddy Mizwar '€” then the incumbent governor and deputy governor '€” spent just Rp 25 billion on their campaign.

The budget cap only applies to activities funded by candidates and political campaigns, such as vote-canvassing, limited meetings and open campaigns.

Meanwhile, other types of campaigning '€” such as public debates on local television or radio stations, election paraphernalia or print media advertisements '€” would get their funding from local government budgets.

Perludem calculations reveal that, if Aher and Deddy had accepted government funding for their campaign, they would have spent just Rp 2.9 billion, far lower from the Rp 490 billion proposed as a budget cap.

Didik said that the budget ceilings had been set too high, because when the KPU designed the formula, it failed to take into account data from past regional elections to see how candidates and political parties actually spent their money.

'€œWhile the use of a formula is inevitable, its application needs to be made consistent with past experience,'€ he said.

Perludem executive director Titi Anggraini suggested the KPU set each region'€™s budget ceiling based on previous campaign spending.

'€œThe KPU could take the highest percentage [of campaign spending] and factor in inflation rates from 2013 to 2015. Then just add 10 percent to get the final figures,'€ she said. '€œHowever, I know it is very difficult to calculate using this
method.'€

Another suggestion was to set a budget cap using population density and multiply it by the average cost of meeting per person in that region, Didik said.

According to the KPU, the aim of the capping the budget was to bring down the cost of democracy, which many have deemed too high.

KPU legal bureau head Nur Syarifah said that there was a possibility for the commission to revise the formula.

'€œWe are still accepting suggestions. Right now, we are conducting a simulation [to test the effectiveness of the formula],'€ she told The Jakarta Post on Thursday.

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