Margareth S. Aritonang, Jakarta – The Indonesian Survey Institute (LSI) found in its survey that the Golkar Party remained the strongest contender in the next general election and would likely garner 17.7 percent of the vote if a general election were to take place today.
The survey also found that the ruling Democratic Party, which won the 2009 general election, would trail in third position with 13.4 percent of the vote behind the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) with 13.6 percent of the votes.
LSI also predicted the surge of the National Democratic Party (Nasdem) which would come in fourth place in LSI's estimate with 5.9 percent of the vote, above the National Awakening Party (PKB) and the United Development Party, both with 5.3 percent of the vote. The Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) was in seventh position with 4.2 percent of the vote.
LSI executive director Dodi Ambardi attributed the rise of Golkar to voters' exposure to television talk shows on social and political issues, which have been very critical toward the ruling Democratic Party.
"Those who regularly watch talk shows will likely leave the Democratic Party and vote for the Golkar Party. Some respondents decided to change their preference because of the harsh criticism directed against the Democratic Party in talk shows," Dodi said on Sunday.
The LSI latest survey interviewed 2,418 respondents between Feb. 25 and March 5 in the country's 33 provinces. The survey was also to gauge the impact of television on voter preferences. Dodi said that 20.3 percent of respondents were between 41 and 55 years old and were considered as intellectually and politically mature.
LSI political analyst Burhanuddin Muhtadi said that television political talk shows could also entice undecided voters into making their choices.
Burhanuddin said that the percentage of undecided voters had dropped from 29 percent in LSI's previous survey to 23 percent. "The reduction in the number of undecided voters corresponds to the growing support for Golkar. We believe that political talk shows have somehow motivated undecided voters to make their preference known, and the Democratic Party appears to be unattractive because of constant criticism it is receiving on the talk shows," he said.
The survey also found that in general the news media, both online and print, had little effect on influencing voters' preferences.
LSI conjectured that political ads, which had yet to be studied thoroughly by the pollster, played a greater role in shaping voter preferences toward political parties, particularly among those who were from lower educational backgrounds or were members of rural communities.
"Seventy-five percent of our respondents said that they had access to television. Most of them, or around 44 percent, preferred to watch sinetrons [soap operas] or movies, while only 32.5 percent watched the news or talk shows. We assumed that these voters gained their knowledge about political parties from ads. However, we must undertake a new study to confirm our assumption," Dodi said.
He added that the government's pro-poor programs, such as direct cash assistance (BLT) and school operational aid (BOS), in addition to the popularity of political leaders, could easily sway voter preferences toward certain political parties.
"Only 11 percent of our respondents regularly read newspapers and update their knowledge about politics or political leaders, while the rest prefer radio or the Internet" he said.
LSI's recent survey shows Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) chairwoman, former president Megawati Soekarnoputri; Great Indonesia Movement (Gerindra) Party chief patron Prabowo Subianto; former vice president from the Golkar Party Jusuf Kalla and Golkar Party chairman Aburizal Bakrie as the most popular presidential candidates.