POLITICS AND SOCIAL ISSUES TRAINING

Is Politics Important?

Satya Nugraha Hotel Yogyakarta, 14 – 16 February, 2014

Two thousand and fourteen is ‘the year of politics and the feast of democracy’ for Indonesians. The high animo to welcome the election of the people is inversely with the students’, showing apathy towards it. It is due to the abolition of political education and the absence of good public figures. The consequences of this condition bring students to answer ‘do not know’ or ‘do not care’ for their response when they have question what politics is. Whereas, they will be the successors of this nation.

To unravel the problems above and to give students some insight, Stube-HEMAT Yogyakarta held a Politics and Social Issues Training, at Satya Nugraha Hotel, Yogyakarta, 14 – 16 February 2014. Having theme 'Politics: Is It Important?’, this training was held in the same time of Valentine Day and little catastrophe of ash rain  due to the eruption of Mount Kelud in East Java. However the participant and the speakers show enthusiasm and great spirit to join the training. The speakers are Eko Prasetyo, SH. (Institute of Social Movement), William E. Aipipidely M.A. (National Coordinator of UNDEF), Miftah Adhi Ikhsanto, S. IP, Mi.OP (Gadjah Mada University) and  Drs. John S. Keban (Golkar Party).

This training tried to reconstruct the participants’ paradigm to view politics, as uttered by Sih Ell Cahyadi Pamungkas (a theological student of UKDW and a youth activist of GKI Gejayan), “Formerly, I am not interested in politics, because politics is identical with a political elites’ unfair play. However, finally, I realized that politics is an important device used by people to fight their vision for the sake of Indonesians’ prosperity. Youth, as the main component of the nation should understand and use their political rights”. A similar idea also comes from Drs. John S. Keban, a legislative candidate from Golkar Party. He motivated participants to be smart in politics and to vote wisely, "Students should be 'literate' in politics if they want to be a light for their surroundings as actually we also do politics practice in our daily life, moreover for such a big deal  of the national prosperity.”

Sofia Atalia, a student of Law Faculty in Janabadra University, and also the training coordinator said "I hope this event enables students to be aware of the importance of politics, and help them to make people aware of the current political issues, so the people have knowledge to vote in the national election. The right conduct of political practice is expected to lead for a democratic governance and social justice as mandated in Pancasila and the Constitution 1945."

This training also gave participants experiences to interact with the Election Commission, National Mandate Party (PAN) functionary, Gerindra Party functionary, and Eko Suwanto ST, M.Si, the legislative candidate from Indonesian Democratic Party – Struggle (PDIP). During the training process, participants had a time to reconstruct their former insight of politics and to get enlightenment. Salute for democracy!