Jakarta – Election hopefuls are pulling the wool over the public's eyes with their outdated campaign methods, a communications expert said Friday.
"The blatant campaign methods using large banners laden with symbols treats the would-be voters as if they are passive consumers willing to buy any candidate displayed in election shop windows," Sahid University director M. Yuwana Mardjuka told The Jakarta Post during a national symposium on communication sciences.
Flashy campaign banners and posters bearing candidates' pictures have mushroomed across the country as the legislative and presidential polls draw near, with the campaign period kicking off next Monday.
More than 12,000 candidates from 38 parties are vying for 550 seats at the House of Representatives.
Yuwana said candidates were underestimating and undermining voters' ability to be critical. "Voters are in fact very critical. They see politicians using money in their game, so they expect to earn money by joining that game. In fact, the would-be voters use the campaign communications processes as bargaining grounds for this," he said.
He added candidates should use fewer symbols and promote more their individual achievements if they wished to smarten up their campaign methods. "Most of the campaigners overshadow themselves with party symbols or famous faces such as that of [founding president] Sukarno or religious figures."
Yuwana dubbed those campaign strategies instant communication methods, designed to achieve nothing more than win the elections.
University of Indonesia (UI) communication sciences lecturer Billy Sarwono said political parties and candidates failed in getting their messages across to the public.
"Research by UI shows most people, especially lower-income ones, merely acknowledge the candidates' faces and slogans, but are unaware of the their ideologies," she said. She added the passive culture of listening and not voicing thoughts articulately still prevailed here.
"We are taught merely to listen, not to read or voice our opinions," she said, adding that good political communications remained far removed from local cultures.
"The teaching of political communication using methods such as debates is still not a priority." Billy added the political elite and leaders also lacked communication skills. Even our leaders often communicate poorly among themselves, leaving us confused," she said.
Yuwana said many politicians still applied outdated communications methods commonly used in the period when freedom of expression was curtailed. (dis)