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Teman Ahok Fair is an advanced way of campaign fundraising: Ahok
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A visitor sits in front of the "aspiration board" during the Teman Ahok Fair at Gudang Sarinah in Pancoran, South Jakarta, on Sunday. Teman Ahok (Friends of Ahok) held a two-day event to collect funding and identity card copies to help the independent candidacy of Jakarta Governor Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama and his running mate Heru Budi Hartono. (Antara/Reno Esnir)
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span style="line-height: 1.6em;">Jakarta Governor Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama has praised the Teman Ahok Fair event held to support his candidacy in the 2017 Jakarta Gubernatorial Election as a new way of election fundraising in the country.
The event, held on May 28 to 29 at Gudang Sarinah in Pancoran, South Jakarta, was a new experiment in nation’s political scene, as Ahok said such an event invited people to participate in donating money to support their preferred candidate.
"We used to think that a lot of money was needed to run in an election. We were short on ideas on how to acquire Rp 1 billion [US$73,638] even, let alone three times that. This is an advanced step for our politics," he said at the fair on Sunday evening as quoted by kompas.com.
An event like this, if successful, could make a huge impact to assisting a candidate, Ahok said. Especially for new leaders who are brave and honest, but do not have the finances to run for public office.
He also expected the spirit of the Teman Ahok Fair to spread throughout the country and inspire people to collaborate in supporting their ideal candidates for future elections.
Ahok also expressed hope that he and running mate Heru Budi Hartono would meet the administrative requirements set by the Jakarta General Election Commission (KPU). The KPU opens registration for independent candidates on July 13 to 17, followed by verification of their support, before opening registration for candidates backed by political parties in August.
Ahok plans to use a similar concept to the Teman Ahok Fair for his campaign.
Teman Ahok (Friends of Ahok), a group of volunteers that supports Ahok's independent candidacy and organizers of the fair, charged a Rp 25,000 to Rp 35,000 entrance fee, depending if prepaid or bought at the gate, to the public. Their aim was to raise Rp 1.4 billion from the fair to assist the registration process of Ahok and Heru, as well as for data collecting.
Project Pop, White Shoes and the Couples Company, Iis Dahlia, Saykoji, Mocca and Sore were among the performers at the fair, which also had a bazaar of culinary and non-culinary products for visitors. The fair also had booths to submit identity card copies as support to Ahok's bid for a second term through the independent route. (rin)
