Post conflict election is becoming crutially important for Aceh government. In this case, election is expected to be an instrument to manage conflict among political ellites. In spite of the expectation, the real is not exactly as it is expected. Record showed that Aceh election had many violations that potentially caused conflict in the next local leaders’ election. Result of election observations by some mass media revealed that Aceh has very high electoral conflict potency. In 2014, 38 major cases are categorized into violation of rules and physical violation [6] as shown in the following table:
Table 1. Violation to rules and Physical violation in 2014 election Type of Violation QuantitY
Torturing 6
Burning cars 5
Intimidation 3
Murdering 3
Kidnaping 2
Damaging the winning post 1
Shooting 1
Damaging campaign attributes 13
Threatening 1
Fabricating letter and document 1 Campaign in forbidden period 2
Community Group called as Kontras [1] noted that in January to April 2014, the political violation was uplifting in some areas of Aceh. Some of the cases were damaging facilities (36 cases), intimidation (6 cases), Shooting (5 cases), fighting between supporters (1 case), kidnapping (2 cases) and torturing (17 cases). In these few months also recorded 6 people died, 27 victims of torture, tens more properties damaged or burned.
Southeast Aceh District is a non-listed area for electoral conflict monitoring. Some election observation organizations mentioned that conflict escalation and electoral violation highly occured in Aceh Pidie, North Aceh, Central Aceh, and South Aceh [1];[2];[3];[4]but Southeast Aceh is not in the list of prone area for electoral conflict.
Through this research, we found out the contrary result compared to the statement above.
Southeast Aceh is a conflict prone area since there were many electoral violations in the year of 2006 – 2017. Even though the tendency is still low, but cautiousness and preventive actions
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should be done continuously to minimize the possibility of electoral conflict in upcoming legislative member’s elections.
The demographic condition of Southeast Aceh, together with its diversity in ethnics and religion, caused the grouping of interest from elite’s politics and community. The difference interest becomes determinant of electoral violation which turns out to be conflict. Following are conflict data that we found in mass media and the field.
Table 2. Electoral Violation and Conflict Cases in Southeast Aceh Throughout the year 2006 – 2017.
Year Case
2006
An alledge of bribery given to the voters which happened 2 days before the voting day, that was December 09, 2006.Some civil servants employee and member of Local House of Representative were alledged bribing the voters in Bun-Bun Alas and Bun-Bun Indah village. They gave Rp.50.000 to the villagers who agreed to elect the incumbent Bupati, Armyn Desky [7].
Rejection of Local Leaders Election done by all candidates due to the accuse toward police who was bias to one of the candidate, did intimidation, and corruption done by Electoral Committee in purchasing the ballot boxes.[8]
lawsuit by the incumbent Bupati, Armyn Desky, and dispute inter-institutions. All dan pertikaian antar lembaga. All of the lawsuits were in the process until 2008, but it did not change the result of Local Leader Election[2];[9];[10].
2009
Burning case- The office of Aceh Party was burned on September 29, 2009 at the time approaching the election (Field data).
On January 05, 2009 the subdistrict level office of Aceh Party which located in Lawe Sumur was burned by unidentified person. This doer was suspected to be supporter from opponent party[11].
2012
Electoral Committee of Southeast Aceh let Armyn Desky passed the
administrative process. He was eks cirminal in corruption case. This violate the administrative requirements, ethical code and also bias to other candidates.
DKPP finally discharged the Electoral Committe Members through the issuance of letter No.04/KE-DKPP/VII/2012 [12].
2014
Teuku riefky Harsya as the head of election observation team from Demokrat party through pers conference on Saturday (April 12, 2014) stated the allegation violation of electoral rules in legislative election. According to him, the fraud was organized and it involved the electoral committee and local government[13].
2016
Demonstration done by thousands supporter of Bupati/Vice Bupati Rasidin Pinim candidate to Southeast Aceh KIP on December 13, 2016. They asked about manipulation in Permanent List of Voter (DPT) [14].
2017
Demonstration at KIP Aceh Tenggara office on May 02, 2017 regarding the payment of 2300 members of village electoral committee in385 villages for 2 months (Field data).
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From the table above, we can analyze that conflict in Southeast Aceh shows the same pattern that is domination of electoral violation. There was no data showing physical harrashment in 200-2017.
In 2006 election, we found out that Southeast Aceh district was the most problematic area in term of result of election.The delay of announcement of winning candidates caused chaos among candidates and also among supporters. Somehow the provincial KIP of Aceh has done intervention, but the case was still not settled. Finally, Hasanuddin was stated won and defeated incumbent Armen Desky with the difference vote in total of 2.624 votes.
Anharminic relation between ellite fractions and supporters can be seen since 2006. It was shown by having high conflict tendency in 2006 local leaders election.Even so, according to interviews with some community member, it was found that conflict continued to village level where the supporters of Hasanudin and Armeyn Desky kept having dispute.The loss of Desky as the incumbent was used by Hasanudin’s supporters to get rid of Desky’s people at village management level.The above table also shown that conflict escalation drom 2016 to 2017 has been decreasing.Despite the conflict happened here is relatively smaller scope compared to other areas in Aceh, but we need to be aware in order to have a peace and democratic election in the future.
DISCUSSION
Based on above data, the researchers will do conflict mapping by using mapping method adopted from SIPABIO model (Source, Issue Parties, Attitude, Behaviour, Intervention, and Outcome) which can be detailed as follow[5]:
Determining Source (conflict source) that means finding the sources of conflict by analyzing social relation (social construction analysis), political identity values, and structural domination (critical and positiveness structural analysis). In Southeast Aceh election, the source of conflict can be from electoral committe or KIP, police, and supporters.Even though Southeast Aceh has a high diversity, but the SARA (ethnic, religion, race) is not the conflict determinant. The electoral committee such as KIP and Police of Southeast Aceh were seen to be bias in performing their task properly which caused the conflict. Aside of that, the source of conflict is from the social relation which is not symmetrical among politcal parties. Each supporter has a high loyality towards the supported candidate. So, he/she can do anything, including violation, to defeat the opponent.
Identifying issues which refer to inter-connected objectives among the dispute parties. The issue is developed by all of dispute parties and other unidentified parties regarding the source of conflict.Related to this, a similar pattern of issues can be seen in Southeast Aceh elections. The pattern is black campaign and fraud which accused among political parties supporters which ended in prejudice and caused conflict.
Identifying Parties in term of conflicted parties both main actor who directly related to the interest, secondary side who indirectly related to interest, and tertiary side who has no interest in conflict. The tertiary side mostly act as neutral side to intervene the conflict.Main actor who becomes dominant in conflict are the supporters of each candidates.Whilst the secondary side are
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the organizing committee and election observation team (Southeast Aceh KIP). This side is directly related to the interest, but its function and tasks most likely not in the right tracks which caused the conflict.The tertiary side in Southeast Aceh electoral conflict is DKPP and provincial KIP. This side is able to neutrally act and push main actor and secondary side/party to stop the conflict.
Analyzing Attitudes/felling that affect the conflict behaviour pattern.Behaviour can be in form of positive and negative towards conflict. Basically, behaviour that affect conflict behaviour pattern is the willingness to rule and rejection to other candidates’ winning. We can analyze that it happened because of personal feeling and being not confidence to win the election. It turns out the supporters and candidate to act unfair in order to win.
Analyzing Behavior in form of social action aspects from parties in conflict, both coercive action and noncoercive action. We can analyze that the conflicted parties have tendency to do noncoercive action. It is shown by the act of fraud, intimidation, and moneypolitics.
Identifying Intervention that is a social act from neutral party to end a conflict. Some conflicts mentioned above have been settled by having interventions from parties such as DKPP and Aceh Provine KIP.
Determining the Outcome which means impacts of actions done by various parties who have conflict in form of situation. The conflict and electoral violation in this district will effect to the deficit of democracy. Sanford Levinson [15]; describes it as a condition where democratic organizations and institutions are not able to fulfill democratic principles in performing their tasks.
The election with fraud and conflict intensity surely will not generating good quality leaders due to the political option given by the community is no longer rational.