Political Parties Not Ready for Their Cadres, Considered One of the Causes of Many Single Candidates

JAKARTA – The Association for Elections and Democracy (Perludem) regrets the large number of sole candidate in the 2024 regional elections This. It is known that regional head candidates who will compete against empty boxes are in 41 locations.

Perludem Executive Director, Khoirunnisa Nur Agustyati mentioned several factors that caused the large number of single candidates. One of them is the political parties (Parpol) that are lacking in cadreship.

“The political parties are not ready with their cadres, so even though the Constitutional Court has given them the opportunity, the requirements have become much easier, but the political parties have not taken advantage of it,” said the woman who is familiarly called Ninis in an online discussion, Sunday (8/9/2024).

In addition, Ninis continued, the proximity of the election to the regional elections is also one of the causes of many regional head candidates running against empty boxes. According to her, this is due to the tug-of-war of the coalition.

“The close proximity between the general election and the regional election has caused the coalition tug-of-war to be quite dynamic, so that the parties still prefer to be in a large coalition,” he said.

Previously, the General Elections Commission (KPU) had extended the registration period for prospective regional head candidates from 2-4 September 2024. The registration extension was carried out in areas where there was a single candidate pair against an empty box.

After the registration extension, there are now 41 regions with a single candidate pair against an empty box in the 2024 Pilkada.

The KPU initially recorded 43 regions. The regions that now have more candidates are Puhowato Regency and Sitaro Islands Regency.

“Now Puhowato Regency, Gorontalo Province and Sitaro Islands Regency, North Sulawesi Province, which initially on August 27-29 2024 only had one candidate pair, now there are two candidate pairs,” said KPU member Idham Holik when confirmed, Thursday (5/9/2024).

(maf)