554 KPPS officers have died: Is KPU involved in systemic crime?

IO – Post – 2019 Elections, the Indonesian Institute of Science (LIPI) political observer Siti Zuhro criticizes the execution of the 2019 Simulationeous Elections have simply been too much for the Election organizers too handle. There has been a constant framing and widespread rumors that the Election Commission  (KPU)  as the election Organizer is involved in various frauds that inflicts a loss to specific Presidential Candidate Pair.

Meanwhile, political observer who is also a researcher from Syarif Hidayatulah Islamic State University (UIN), Adi Prayitno is concerned  of the KPU saying it seemed to underestimate public criticism against the 2019 Elections. “KPU must be evaluated for their total performance. They should not underestimate  the people’s criticism, merely  the input should be taken as to legitimize the KPU”. Said Adi. 

Adi gave an example, the fact that there have been as many as 554 of the Voting Organizing Group (KPPS) officers who died due to fatigue in guarding the vote counts. Not to mention the findings of the wrong C1 input into the Vote Counting System (Situng) of KPU and the news of C6s for which were not spread out to the voting community.

Based on TVOne R & D data, until Sunday (5/5), there have been 554 election officers who had died. The highest number of victims was from KPPS officials, which reached 440 people.

While the other death victims came from Election Supervisory officers (Panwaslu) totaling 92 people.  While from the police department, there were 22 people.

Besides the death toll, the 2019 election also caused illness.  From the same data, the number of sick KPPS officers reached 3,788 people.

 So far the government has provided compensation to the families of victims of KPPS officers, which varies, such as Rp. 36 million for death victims, Rp. 30 million for disability, and Rp. 8.5 – 16.5 million for those injured.

Adi said “KPU could have anticipated this from the beginning of this multiple  obstacles considering  the Presidential Election and Legislative Elections were to be held simultaneously. The KPPS should not have to work extra, facing simultaneous Elections which physically exhausting them; they even were unable to rest in one or two days. Psychologically, they are also pressured by legislative candidates, presidential election’s campaign teams so that they must face so much political, moral, and physical burden, all accumulated”.