This study discusses the expansion of the candidate for the New Autonomous Region of Panton Labu City, originating from the wishes of the people in the five sub-districts in the eastern tip of North Aceh Regency. This expansion occurred because the community felt that development in the area did not receive enough attention from the Government and was very lagging behind in the development of health, infrastructure, education, culture, and even public policy. In addition, the area is very far from the central Government, and the distance to the area takes a lot of time. The formulation of the problem in this study was the cause of the expansion in Panton Labu City and the political orientation of the expansion of the Candidate for the New Autonomous Region of Panton Labu City. The purpose of the study was to identify the problems that caused the expansion of Panton Labu City and determine the political orientation of the expansion of the New Autonomous Region of Panton Labu City. This expansion occurred because the community of five sub-districts in the eastern tip of North Aceh Regency saw a lack of attention from the Central Government in development (education, infrastructure, health services, and public services) and culture compared to the existing regions in the Central Government area of North Aceh Regency. Second, the political orientation of the expansion of Panton Labu City was only to improve the welfare of the people in the region to be more advanced. However, some move to politics because the expansion committee members were not only from ordinary people but also from the political elites. Data collection techniques used were interviews, Documentation, and data analysis. The results showed that the political orientation of the expansion of the Panton Labu City CDOB had two aspects, namely purely for the realization of public welfare and the opportunity to gain power in government by politicians from Panton Labu. The expansions formation and mechanism were determined at the ratification of Panton Labu City by the Ministry of Home Affairs. The obstacle of the expansion for the Panton Labu City CDOB area was due to differences in Political Orientation in the regional expansion realization.

No abstract

This article discusses the urgency for simultaneous Regional Elections during the Covid-19 pandemic in Indonesia in 2020. The Regional Elections (Pilkada) in Indonesia will be conducted simultaneously by 270 regions, consisting of nine provincial-level regional heads, 224 district level regional heads, and 37 regional head of City level. Perppu No. 2 of 2020 concerning Regional Elections states that it will be held on December 9, 2020. The Covid-19 pandemic has hit all parts of the world and causes deaths, including in Indonesia. Regional Elections will still be held based on various considerations by stakeholders. This article examines the urgency of implementing simultaneous Regional Elections and its obstacles during the Covid-19 pandemic. It is a qualitative study and uses a literature review as the data. The results show that Covid-19 Pandemic affects political activities, which involves large numbers of people. Meanwhile, people are required not to gather/do activities in great numbers because there is a risk of spreading the virus, which ignores the government's spirit to break the chain of spreading the virus itself. However, the Regional Elections (Pilkada) ar considered to have crucial urgency and very urgent. Besides, it raises questions about whether it is due to bureaucratic factors that cannot be empty in the government structure or other political factors that require the elections to be held.

Purpose The purpose of this study is to critically understand and to find out the social political role of the Acehnese ulamas (Muslim scholars) in solving and coping with social issues faced by contemporary Acehnese society. Design/methodology/approach This study was conducted in the province of Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam, especially in the districts of Aceh Utara, Pidie, Aceh Besar, Aceh Selatan and Aceh Timur. The locations were chosen based on the consideration of the objective conditions that many ulamas are dwelling and easily be found within these areas. Besides, the locations are historically believed as the origins of the Acehnese that are so diverse. In addition, a large number of social problems frequently arose within those regions. The subjects of this research study were a number of community determined by purposive sampling technique. The instruments used for the data collection in this research were observation, in-depth interview and library study; and interpretative understanding was also used to analyze the data. Findings The existence of the Acehnese ulamas represents the government’s recognition to word the traditional institutional in Aceh. However, some people think that institutions are used by government to exploit ulama as the mediator between government and society. For the Acehnese ulamas, the presence of the institution could be used to consolidate their power for the benefit of the people. Originality/value The originality of this research can be seen from the effort to explain how contemporary Acehnese society views Theologian (ulama) in solving social problems, which were little studied by previous researchers. This question is important to examine, given the position of ulama in people’s lives since the pre-independence period and during the social revolution that had occurred in Aceh until the early 1970s was very dominant. That is, even the symbolic world of Acehnese society formed through the dominance of ulama discourse has structured how people’s responses typically must be expressed.