- 11/12/2023
- Category: Press Release
Yogyakarta, December 8, 2023 – The transformation of political party campaigns is marked by their dissemination on social media channels. This is due to the large number of users, indicating potential voter influence within these platforms. However, despite the high volume of ads, the transparency and accountability of political ad expenditures are relatively low. Moreover, the lack of regulations on this matter raises the potential for manipulation of public opinion by influencers. In response, CfDS collaborates with Perludem in Desus #9: “Political Ads on Social Media and Funding Transparency,” aiming to raise public awareness of monitoring political ads and campaigns on social media. Arga Irmawan (Lecturer at the Department of Political Science and Government, UGM & Adjunct Researcher at CfDS) and Heroik M. Pratama (Researcher and Senior Program Officer at Perludem) are the speakers at this event, moderated by Allysa Putri Rendry (Partnership Staff at CfDS).
Communication Patterns of Political Parties and Challenges to Democracy
Arga Irmawan opened his presentation by explaining that the digital space’s development has become an arena of competition and influence among actors. This is reflected in every infographic that tends to lean towards certain values, representing different communication pattern trends from candidates of each political party.
The communication pattern trend of Anies Baswedan shifted from an everyday politician to a political celebrity, evident through symbols like the waving hand. This shift is significant in his three activities, such as when he became a spokesperson emphasizing democratic values, as Minister of Education maintaining distance, marked by the separation of institutional accounts in his posts. The peak is when running for president, making his tweets more focused on a narrative approach.
On the other hand, Prabowo Subianto’s communication trend has changed from a superstar politician in 2014 with his military appearance to an everyday politician. This is reflected in various light-hearted posts on his social media, such as cats.
Additionally, Ganjar Pranowo, initially known as an everyday politician, has transformed into a political celebrity, especially near the elections.
“Nevertheless, this communication pattern trend creates challenges for future electoral democracy, where the situation becomes increasingly fluid, making it difficult to detect nuances in political campaigns. Additionally, campaign funds on social media are also unreported in terms of spending on influencers and ad expenses,” concluded Arga Irmawan.
Campaign Ads and Funding Transparency
The mechanism for reporting campaign funds categorizes the financial regime of political parties into two phases: outside the election period and during the election. The latter is further subdivided into three forms, namely the initial report of campaign funds, the contribution report, and the expenditure report. Non-compliance in reporting can lead to disqualification in elections, but unfortunately, there are still weaknesses in this mechanism, according to findings from Perludem.
There are findings of unreported ads on social media from each regional election in 2020, such as one candidate in Makassar spending around 900 million. The campaign fund report aims to include various indicators, such as funds and services. According to data, more dominant ads come from unofficial or unregistered accounts, potentially not fully reported. “Perludem believes that regardless of the extent of advertising activities on social media if accurately reported, it will contribute positively to transparency and accountability of campaign funds,” added Heroik Pratama.
In conclusion, to address the main challenge of the 2024 election, namely the lack of transparency and accountability, especially on social media platforms, the Election Supervisory Agency (Bawaslu) needs to conduct a review to track campaign fund reports with tools such as the Meta Ads Library.
Author: Muhammad Alfasya Syabil Sholatar
Editor: Ni Kadek Ayu Pratiwi
