Citizen Participation Benchmarks the General Election

Jakarta, InfoPublik – Elections Supervisory Agency (Bawaslu) Comissioner Nasrullah stated that citizen participation becomes the benchmark of  a democratic general election. 

“Citizen participation is very important since the election belongs to the citizen, not the election organizer’s nor the government’s,” said Nasrullah in his press release, Saturday (1/28).

Nasrullah said that if the citizens are considered as objects, they are only needed once in five years and would be treated inhumanly. 

“This is an inhuman way of thinking, so unethical, and poor in morality aspect,” he added. 

Nasrullah asserted that Bawaslu would like to make a change by giving back the election to the citizen. “Citizen participation is very important. It is impossible for the supervisory agency to work alone. We need contribution from the citizen to supervise, too,” he explained.

He mentioned that another benchmark for a democratic election is the ability to develop a healthy competition process. “The officials of the supervisory agency need to materialize a competent organization of general election,” he concluded. (Translator: Erik Limantara)