Jakarta (ANTARA) - Openness on the part of families is necessary for collecting data on disabled voters ahead of the 2024 General Election and Regional Head Elections, the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) has said.
"Since 2019, the data collection of persons with disabilities as voters has been constrained with issues in family openness," the head of the commission's observation team for citizens' Constitutional rights fulfillment for the 2024 elections, Pramono Ubaid Tanthowi, said here on Friday.
Families need to be open about submitting data to their family members, he added. According to Tanthowi, the concealment of disabled persons by their own families happens because of the negative stigma that still exists in society.
Due to the stigma, family members feel reluctant to tell anyone about the condition of their family member. Tanthowi urged families to specify any disability their family members suffer from clearly.
This would help the General Elections Commission (KPU) to provide facilities that suit their needs. "This condition will result in facility provisions that do not match the data. There are disabled persons, but their families hide them, so the KPU does not have a database to provide facilities," he explained.
Meanwhile, Komnas HAM highlighted that the KPU is still focused on collecting data at social centers. "The KPU is focusing its data collection on people with disabilities who live in social centers, which have exact (information) on the number and type of disabilities," he said.
However, the agency informed that this situation makes it difficult to obtain valid and representative data on persons living with disabilities in many regions. Komnas HAM also conveyed a number of problems experienced by other vulnerable groups ahead of the 2024 elections.
These vulnerable groups include prisoners, plantation and mining workers, Indonesian migrant workers (PMI), domestic workers (PRT), communities living in border areas, indigenous peoples, and isolated tribal groups.
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It also addressed problems among religious or ethnic minorities, the elderly, the LGBTQ community, people with HIV/AIDS, refugees of social conflicts or natural disasters, homeless people, women, patients and health workers, and first-time voters.
Komnas HAM will convey its recommendations on these issues to the electoral stakeholders, among others, the KPU and the General Elections Supervisory Agency (Bawaslu). (INE)