Young People

Should Be Critical To Vote

Follow-up activities of “Young, Millennial, Political Literacy” Training held by Stube-HEMAT Yogyakarta, intriguing participants to share what they had received from the training individually or in a groups. Some participants who called themselves the PAPEDA (Papua Full of Peace) group consisting of Hanis, Ram, Yansen, Yubelina, Roni, and Frengki conducted a follow-up at the University of Janabadra on Saturday, March 2, 2019.

Ram Hara, a Janabadra student from Maybrat, West Papua who is also as the Social Minister of the student Executive Board of Janabadra University, said that this activity was a collaboration between the Ministry of Social Affairs of Janabadra University and the PAPEDA follow-up group.

Expectations of this activity is to share positive understanding and knowledge with other students about the politics gained during the Stube-HEMAT training. The content of the event became more complete with a discussion about reflection on Indonesian politics presented by Frans A. Djalong, M.A., a lecturer from the Department of Sociology at Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, Gajah Mada University.

Located in the room 1.21 of the Faculty of Engineering, University of Janabadra, the event started at 10:00-13.15 Western Indonesian Time. Twenty-two students from various campus such as UGM, Janabadra, and APMD attended the session. Mariano Lejap, the representative of Stube-HEMAT Yogyakarta started the event with an introduction of the institution, followed by sharing experiences from the PAPEDA group represented by Yube, Roni and Yansen.

In his presentation, Frans Djalong reflected on the situation of the country's politics, starting from the beginning of Soekarno and other national figures in utilizing the Geopolitical situation and using it for Indonesian independence. The book entitled 'Di Bawah Bendera Revolusi' is one reference for students to read more about history. Furthermore, one of the points about political theory according to him is that there is no theory and practice, theory is the practice itself.

Does a farmer doing gardening have no theory? Actually, a theory is a set of thoughts that make a person acting regularly and systematically from time to time. The task of students is to check the theory behind a practice or action. So that students are required to be more critical in making political choices. In the current political situation Frans Djalong advised, "As students, we need to be critical, not deify Jokowi or Prabowo as personal, but what is behind that? Who is behind Jokowi? Who is behind Prabowo? What concepts do they offer to build Indonesia from Aceh to Papua?”

At the end of the session, Robinson, one of the Stube HEMAT Yogyakarta work teams invited all student participants, especially students coming from out of Java Island to check their names in ”Lindungihakpilihmu.com” and reminded participants not to abstain from the upcoming democratic party, April 17, 2019 by taking A5 Forms or information about moving voters and welcome them to the democratic party. (ML).