By: Ridwan Putra Khalan )*
All parties should be able to increase vigilance in being aware of efforts being made by a handful of irresponsible parties who are continuing to try to delegitimize the implementation of the upcoming 2024 elections, one of which is by raising the issue of polemics over voter data which are considered strange and odd. In fact, all voter data is processed very strictly through many stages by the KPU.
The organizers of the General Election (Pemilu), namely the General Election Commission (KPU) alleged that there were indeed certain parties who were indeed continuing to try to delegitimize the existence of the democratic party and political contestation event which was to be held in the upcoming 2024. Mainly, the delegitimization effort is found in allegations of as many as 52 million voter data which are considered strange and full of irregularities.
Regarding this matter, the KPU Coordinator for Data and Information, Betty Epsilon Idroos, said that all this time her party had always maintained openness for any information, including when updating voter data in all stages of the election.
It is also undeniable that it is getting closer to the implementation of the democratic party which is held every 5 (five) years in Indonesia, there will always be various kinds of efforts from many parties who always want that the circulation of the change of leadership is not carried out, namely by continuing to delegitimize the implementation of General Elections .
In fact, there have been allegations that it appears that there is strange and also odd data for as many as 52 million people, which is wrong information, invalid and very far-fetched.
How could it not be, the article regarding validity related to voter data in the implementation of the 2024 Election, the people themselves are even able to carry out their monitoring directly and independently through websites that are available and can be accessed by anyone as a form of information disclosure and transparency that has been provided by the General Election Commission for the people.
In fact, efforts to continue to maintain transparency and openness of all types of information, including regarding the validity of voter data, have been continuously carried out by the KPU and have been implemented since the end of 2022.
The sequence regarding the process of validating voter data is carried out by the election organizers, namely the KPU by means of which they initially received Population Data on Potential Voters (DP4) from the Ministry of Home Affairs of the Republic of Indonesia (Kemendagri RI) at the end of 2022.
Then it was discovered that the data reported from the Ministry of Home Affairs was a total of 206,462,766 people in DP4 who could be categorized as potential voters at the democratic party event, which then the data was re-processed in synchronization using the latest voter data which had previously been owned by KPU.
It doesn’t just stop there, but after synchronization is carried out using the last voter data owned by the election management body, then there is still a direct field check of all the voter data.
Of course, the main objective of the entire process and checking is to validate the election voters’ data so that people who have registered as voters can be sure that they really meet the requirements. For information, all of these checks are carried out by the Voter Data Updating Committee (Pantarlih) by conducting matching and research (coklit).
With the formation of a separate committee whose job is to check and match voter data very thoroughly, it is one of the many clear proofs that indeed the KPU in matters of ensuring voter data is not arbitrary and truly serious and focused.
The Voter Data Updating Officer or Pantarlih who conducts coklit will also come directly to each prospective voter’s house for the duration of the period from 14 February 2023 to 16 March 2023. Then, based on all the results of such a lengthy process including the checking and research, the KPU itself on April 18 2023, a Temporary Voter List (DPS) was established consisting of 205,853,518 people.
This stipulation is also not carried out immediately, but must first have the results of the poll, which are then recapitulated and determined very openly by the district or city KPU as well as the provincial KPU.
So it is clear that the process of validating voter data is not only done once, but through several steps and procedures to minimize errors in validity. Moreover, indeed the General Election Commission itself has also provided access that is so open to all people to be able to carry out independent checks at any time.
Therefore, an issue emerged regarding the voter data polemic which seemed to be considered and accused by a handful of irresponsible people if there were strange and awkward voter data. Of course, all the issues that occur must be able to keep an eye on all parties because they could be an attempt to delegitimize the implementation of the 2024 elections.
)* The author is a contributor to Nusantara Reading Room
