Yustinus Paat, Jakarta – The Election Supervisory Agency, or Bawaslu, found that both pairs of candidates contesting the 2019 presidential election, Joko "Widodo" Widodo-Ma'ruf Amin and Prabowo Subianto-Sandiaga Uno, failed to follow administrative procedures in their campaign receipt and expenditure reports.
"In terms of transparency and accountability, both pairs of candidates did not follow administrative procedures, including by not fully revealing the identities of their donors in the reports," Bawaslu official Fritz Edward Siregar said at the Millennium Hotel in Jakarta on Tuesday.
This complicates the verification process done by the Bawaslu. Campaign finance reporting is a vital part of having transparent and accountable elections.
"The identities of the donors should include their address, telephone number, identity card number and taxpayer identification number [NPWP]. Some of them were still not filled in [in the reports]," he said.
In Jokowi and Ma'ruf Amin's campaign finance report, there were 222 individual donors, three campaign funding groups and five business entities that donated to their campaign. Their full details were not disclosed.
Prabowo Subianto and Sandiaga Uno's campaign had 42 individual donors and 18 campaign funding groups with incomplete identities.
Fritz said there is a legal vacuum concerning the regulation of campaign funds during the election, especially at regional level.
Law No. 7/2017 on elections only penalizes those who fail to report their campaign funds at the national level to the General Elections Commission (KPU), he said.
"Campaign teams at the regional level are obliged to to submit their [campaign finance] reports to the KPU at each level [subdistrict, district, city, provincial]," Fritz said.