The Election Supervisory Agency Invites Journalists to Produce True News to Fight Hoaxes

Jakarta, General Elections Supervisory Agency - In a series of separate meetings with the Indonesian Journalists Association and the Indonesian Television Journalists Association, the General Elections Supervisory Agency invites journalists to produce elections correctly.

According to the Chairperson of the General Elections Supervisory Agency, Rahmat Bagja and Member of the General Elections Supervisory Agency, Lolly Suhenty, this is for political education and to prevent the spread of hoaxes.

Bagja stated that political polarization in the upcoming 2024 elections could trigger violations and divisions in society. He said that this polarization had occurred in the 2014 and 2019 presidential elections and was successfully minimized because of the collaboration with the press.

So he sees that because the general election will be bigger, namely facing elections in 514 regencies/cities and 33 governor elections, more preparation is needed.

"We have experience with polarization of presidential candidates in 2014 and 2019. We cannot handle polarization alone. It really needs cooperation with friends from the Indonesian Journalists Association," said Bagja at the General Elections Supervisory Agency Office, Jakarta, Wednesday ( 22/6/2022).

To representatives of the Indonesian Television Journalists Association, Bagja also invited the crew of television journalists to contribute to mapping the problem.

"For example, the Association of Indonesian Television Journalists with regional networks makes a mapping of the election or election vulnerability index. Later it can be combined with data from the General Elections Supervisory Agency," he explained.

Agreeing with Bagja, General Election Supervisory Body Member Lolly Suhenty also saw that the General Elections Supervisory Body with the authority to supervise, handle violations, and resolve disputes could be the subject of false accusations.

"With the limited time for handling violations and resolving disputes by one of the parties who feel aggrieved, accusations or hoaxes can appear on social media. Therefore, we expect the support of journalists to make news that is true and disseminated strongly so that it can provide enlightenment to the public ,' he explained.

He said the issue of political polarization needs to be prevented from public participation, one of which is the press. Because according to him, the potential for violations in the future will be high because one of them is the issue of political polarization due to our young voters which is projected to penetrate 60 percent.

So Lolly hopes that the Indonesian Journalists Association can jointly be responsible for the public education process to be able to suppress various hoax issues. So that in the future, he sees that this endeavor can create a fair and transparent democracy, so that public participation is expected to increase.

"It is our public relations responsibility to ensure that all information to the public is accurate because the context of disinformation can spread if the General Elections Supervisory Body fails to quickly disseminate true and accurate information," explained Lolly to the Indonesian Journalists Association.

"This is our demand and can only be done together," She added.

On this occasion, the General Chairperson of the Indonesian Journalists Association Atal Sembiring Depari also welcomed the things that were conveyed by the General Elections Supervisory Agency so that he would disseminate information to all journalists so that they can provide positive news to support the implementation of the General Election. Likewise, he continued, if there is disinformation, as far as possible, he can immediately provide clarification if it is not true.

"It is necessary for the media to be able to convey information that the public needs to know so that it will be grounded. At the same time, to verify hoaxes," She said.

Meanwhile, the Chairman of the Indonesian Television Journalists Association, Herik Kurniawan, assured that his party had created a curriculum in the world of the press which was expected to help tackle hoaxes.

"The Indonesian Television Journalists Association will launch the 2024 Election Guards and also participate in various training workshops," he explained.