Mahfud Md Believes 2020 Election Won't Be Covid-19 Infection Cluster

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Coordinating Minister for Political, Legal, and Security Affairs Mahfud Md monitored the implementation of the 2020 Regional Head Election or Pilkada along with the Covid-19 Mitigation Task Force Chief Doni Monardo.

According to Mahfud, as of 2 p.m. Western Indonesian Time (WIB) today, the election ran well.

"Alhamdulillah, it is going well until 2 p.m. Hopefully until this afternoon, there will be no bad news about all of this afterward,” said the minister in a virtual press conference on Wednesday, Dec. 9.

Mahfud said the good result of the monitoring which was carried out until this afternoon dismissed the concerns of many parties about the potential for a new cluster of Covid-19 infection from the regional election event.

He argued that the data showed there was no significant difference in the development of virus cases in regions that held the election or not.

“There is no actual relation between the increasing number of people infected with Covid-19 and the establishment of regional elections,” Mahfud Md remarked.

Previously, the Covid-19 mitigation task force said it inspected the simultaneous elections. The task force member Dewi Nur Aisyah outlined 29 regencies or cities holding the election are at a high risk of Covid-19 transmission, 220 regencies/cities are at medium risk, and 56 regencies/cities at low risk, while 4 regencies/cities are virus risk-free or classified as green zones.

Read: Election in Papua Delayed due to Lack of Materials

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