Kupastuntas.co, Bandar Lampung - PT Sugar Group Companies (SGC) is said to have always backed up one of the candidates during the Lampung governor election. Then, will PT Sugar Group Companies return to support the same governor candidate in the upcoming 2024 Lampung gubernatorial election, even though he is currently being criticized by many netizens after the Tiktoker video of Bima Yudo Saputro went viral.

University of Lampung political observer, Budi Kurniawan, assessed that PT PT Sugar Group Companies support for the upcoming 2024 Lampung governor election is still very dynamic.

According to him, the PT Sugar Group Companies will certainly carry out detailed and careful calculations before deciding which governor candidates to support and be able to meet PT Sugar Group Companies needs.

"Whether the PT Sugar Group Companies will sponsor the incumbent or not is of course an interesting question. If the PT Sugar Group Companies sees that the popularity of the current Governor is declining and cannot be regulated, it means that the PT Sugar Group Companies will transfer it to another candidate, the PT Sugar Group Companies will calculate," said the Unila Faculty of Social Sciences lecturer. Wednesday, April 26, 2023.

Budi said, the viral criticism of Tiktoker from Lampung Bima with the title 'the reason Lampung is not moving forward', could influence public perception of Arinal Djunaidi who is predicted to run again in the 2024 Lampung gubernatorial election.

"Especially young voters from the millennial generation or generation Z who are social media literate," he added.

According to Budi, political parties in Lampung are easily bought by companies as sponsorships in the upcoming 2024 Lampung gubernatorial election process, so that Lampung residents do not have a choice of alternative candidates who can compete with PT Sugar Group Companies.

"Regional head elections in Indonesia are like that in reality. Like Ridho was supported before, now it is not supported anymore, PT Sugar Group Companies is flexible," he said.

he explained, based on scientific research, money politics is mostly carried out in areas that are economically very dependent on agricultural commodities, such as in Lampung.

"In Lampung, plantation companies have financed it. It has been proven in various studies that they use it. At the same time, they argue that usually the center of poverty is in Java. It turns out that money politics in Java is not as big as in Lampung," he said.

It was this, continued Budi, that later made Lampung very prone to money politics.

"Since the 2014 gubernatorial election to 2019, Lampung has been sponsored by the sugar company PT Sugar Group Companies. This is not only what I said, but also in the journals of experts who said that Lampung was sponsored by a sugar company for the sake of usufructuary rights," he explained.

Budi admitted that currently Arinal's position as Chairman of the Regional Leadership Council of the Lampung Golkar Party is still very strong within the party's internal affairs. Although, currently Arinal's figure continues to be scorned by netizens on social media regarding Bima's criticism.

"The ones who are very influential in Golkar are the Central Leadership Council, Airlangga Hertanto and Paulus. As long as Arinal can serve the Golkar Central Executive Board, Arinal will be safe," he stated.

According to him, in the internal leadership of the Lampung Golkar Regional Leadership Council, currently there is no potential figure who can beat Arinal Djunaidi.

"In the past there was Azis Syamsudin, now there is no one who is strong. So like it or not, Arinal still has very strong influence in Golkar Lampung," he said.

The secretary of the Lampung Golkar Regional Leadership Council, Ismet Roni, when contacted, said that he did not want to give a deep response. According to him, the public has the right to judge.

"Just let the people respond and evaluate it, everything has been processed," said Ismet.

Ismet claims that Arinal's relationship as Chair of the Lampung Golkar Regional Leadership Council and the board members remains solid, despite Bima's public criticism. "We're really solid," said Ismet. Until the news was published, PT SGC could not be contacted. (*)