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Youth not ‘an election commodity’: young politicians
Young politicians speak up about concerns that the youth are only being seen as an election commodity with little regard to their actual political aspirations.
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Senior high school students attend an election simulation held during the Center for Election and Political Party’s (CEPP) election awareness campaign event themed 'Rock the Vote Indonesia: Embracing Young Voters with Gender Awareness' at the University of Indonesia campus in Depok, West Java, on Dec. 4, 2016. (Antara/Indrianto Eko Suwarso)
Young politicians are speaking up about the age-old quandary of how first-time voters are being catered to in the upcoming 2024 general elections, amid mounting concerns that the youth is only seen as a commodity with little regard to their actual political aspirations.
According to election data analyzed by the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), the 17-39 age demographic is set to make up 60 percent of voters in the 2024 general election.
But with the way Indonesia’s political system is structured, many proponents of the youth are starting to speak up about ways to improve the system.
East Java Deputy Governor Emil Dardak, who first entered politics in 2015 when he was still 31 as the regent of Trenggalek, East Java, shared this concern in a discussion hosted by the CSIS titled Democracy, the Youth and the 2024 Election on Tuesday.
“This is a vicious cycle, if the youth feels that the government has never paid enough attention to their concerns, they would resort to apathy and pragmatism on politics,” said Emil.
During his brief political career, Emil has frequently met with disenfranchised voters who argue that no matter who is sitting in the presidential seat, things have generally stayed the same.
A young member of the United Indonesia Party’s (Perindo) central executive board, Michael Sianipar, went even further by claiming that the youth in Indonesia are victims of political “tokenism.”
