Celebrity Politics Led Inanimate Political Condition

By kurniati

Mathematics/02151009

 The existence of artists in Indonesia is very entertaining for society. Even, every artist always has thousand or maybe million  fans and big fans spread over an area. By this condition, the popularity of artists were highlighted by political parties in Indonesia to join in legislative election. Each political party is competing to get vote as much as possible in order to get seat in Senayan using artist popularity. In other word, if a party has many cadres who sit in Senayan, it will increase the electability of the party in the presidential election. Therefore, celebrity politics phenomena should be avoided because it can lead us to inanimate political condition.            

                Firstly, celebrity is just as a vote getter for political party to grab a seat in legislative election. In this decade, celebrity politics phenomena increasingly widespread. The function of artists are not only as entertainer, but also as a regulator for society. Using the popularity of artists are the easiest way for political parties to find more seat in legislative election because political parties will not spend much cost to promote their candidate. Clearly, this celebrity politics phenomena is instant way that political parties had done to get power. Akbar Tanjung, a former chairman of the Functional Groups Party (Golkar) (“Caleg Artis Non”:2013), states that he was dissapointed because a lot of legislative candidate are not from caderization process but instantly from some groups who have certain power such us artists, investors, businessmen. He also claims that it had violated the principles of democratic caused functions of political parties diverge.

Secondly, the quality, capability, intellectual, experience of legeslative candidate become unimportant. The fact is political situation in Indonesia last ten years has shifted.  The essence of politic as room together to build a good society shifted as private room. Meanwhile, political parties as political actors also shifted the function. At first, political parties are media for society’s aspiration, nowdays changes into industrial power by personal individual to get private room. One of the shifting is celebrity who bound by political parties to get power in parliament. Unfortunatelly, the political parties don’t care whether their candidates have good quality, morality or not but the most important is “private room”. Tjipta Lesmana, political observers, explains “a lot of artists never give contribution at all. It is caused by stupid political party. The member of representatives is very respectable position, they have very heavy responsibility”(“Caleg Artis Jangan”:2013).

Thirdly, “idol syndrome” being the reason to vote than “aspiration”. In this case, the presence of an artist is very profitable for political party. Need to know, the duties and authority of parliament members, point eleven is “menyerap, menghimpun, menampung dan menindaklanjuti aspirasi masyarakat” (“Tugas dan Wewenang”: -). It means that every member in parliament must be represent society to aspire all of their needs, their desires at government level. However, an aspiration by society will be realized if our representative knows everything about the society condition well. To understand the condition of our society the member of parliament as representative must have skill, intellectual, experience in politics. It is quite different with tedency of artist who want to be one of member in parliament, they just want to boost the electability of particular political party. Then, when they succeed to get seat in parliament they can’t aspire desires of the community. Thus, people must be aware to choose political representatives. It must be not only well-known, but must be able to aspire the society needs and wants.

If we talk about human right, it can be true that everyone has right to build their nation, to advance their nation but when we talk about feasibility, political orientation it cannot be justified. Regardless that each person has right to put themselves forward as representatives they must have very good quality in capability and morality. Because quality and morality are important to build prosperity of a nation.  Some people state that politics is no longer considered something horrible, but because many artists entered the circle, it becomes something entertaining. We must aware that politics and entertaining world are different. Politics is the root of society’s life; it’s not simple as entertaining world. Politics actually is a "vehicle" used by leaders to achieve the expected goals for society. Underlying tendency of artists entered into the world of politics is to help a particular political party to boost the ranking in order to get place in the government system. In short, there are many reasons that celebrity politics can led us to inanimate political condition. Celebrity politics is a symbol of lack of good recruitment process by parties in Indonesia. To build a conducive political condition , the essence of politic and the function of politics parties must be true. All forms of political deviation such us celebrity politics to boost vote must be solved wisely by good caderizazion process.
(821 words)

References:

·         Tugas dan Wewenang. Retrieved on May 17, 2013 from http://www.dpr.go.id/id/tentang-dpr/tugas-dan-wewenang.

·         -. 2013. Caleg Artis Jangan Masuk Senayan. Retrieved on May 15, 2013 from http://www.jpnn.com/read/2013/05/06/170628/caleg-artis-jangan-sampai-masuk-senayan-.

·         -. 2013. Caleg Artis non Kaderisasi Mengecewakan. Retrieved on May 17, 2013 from http://www.pikiran-rakyat.com/node/234739 .