Yogyakarta, November 20th 2020—Center for Digital Society held the 39th Difussion on Friday (20/11). In this occasion, CfDS brought the theme Integrity of Election Ads and Campaigns on Social Media. Janitra Haryanto and Amelinda Pandu as the Project Officer of the Research Division of CfDS were the speakers of this event. The event started at 03.30 p.m. and was moderated by Perdana Karim, Research Assistant of CfDS.
Janitra, together with Amel, admitted that at the beginning of the year, he had researched political advertisements and campaigns on social media, especially those related to the upcoming regional elections. In early 2020 to mid 2020, CfDS conducted research to formulate policy recommendations related to political campaigns on social media. The research was conducted in three cities in Indonesia based on the election hazard index: DKI Jakarta, Yogyakarta and Padang. The research was conducted with a review of related regulations and focus group discussions with relevant stakeholders. Among them were presenting academics, non-governmental organizations, representatives of the regional and central of the General Commission Elections of Indonesia, representatives of the regional and central of the Election Supervisor Body of Indonesia.
From the research that has been done, there are several findings related to campaign advertising on social media. The findings include the period when campaign advertisements are shown and are still running during the election silence period. The duration of ad for a campaign that is governed by the framework of ‘ad slots’ is limited to 30 seconds per pair of candidates. In addition, there is also a ban on campaign advertising on social media. According to Janitra, this ban was due to the difficult regulation of campaign advertising on social media.
“My assumption is that maybe rather than being too difficult to manage this campaign advertisement, it might be better to just ban it because in fact problems like this are quite complicated because we are in the era of COVID-19, the government is also very supportive of social distancing, political campaign advertising in the media. social media can be an alternative for pairs of candidates to convey their impression messages to prospective voters,” he said.
After Janitra discussed regulatory issues during advertisements and political campaigns, Amel explained her recommendations regarding campaign advertising on social media. Following the public test of PKPU revision No. 4/2017 which was held on September 11, 2020, CfDS UGM recommended to still allow campaign advertisements to be shown on social media. In addition, it is also necessary to regulate the implementation of campaign advertising on social media in more detail, especially in relation to:
- The upper limit for campaign advertising costs on social media per political party or coalition of political parties, candidate pairs and/ campaign team
- Transparency of campaign advertising costs on social media issued by political parties or coalitions of candidate pairs and/campaign teams
- Duration of campaign advertisements per political party or coalition of political parties, pair of candidates and/campaign team
Then, regarding the arrangement for implementing sanctions for violators of the General Commission Elections and he Election Supervisor Body regulations, CfDS recommended:
- Increase enforcement of sanctions against campaign implementers and participants who violate the General Commission Elections and he Election Supervisor Body regulations
- Ensure that the implications of the sanctions imposed have a deterrent effect
- Strive to provide administrative sanctions for violators
Furthermore, CfDS also recommended revising the provisions regarding political advertising and campaigns on social media. In addition, the revision of provisions regarding social media accounts of campaign implementers and participants, as well as strengthening of monitoring of political campaigns on social media. However, for now the government is still in the stage of fixing this matter.
“There has been an effort from the government to improve in this matter, now is the time for us to just wait about what the future developments will be like,” Amel said. The reruns of this event can be watched on CfDS YouTube channel.