EXPLAINER – Who and what will be key in Indonesia’s elections

By Riyaz ul Khaliq

ISTANBUL (AA) – Millions of Indonesians will have their say on Wednesday in Indonesia to elect the next president and vice-president, along with local and parliamentary representatives.

Around 204 million people are eligible to vote from among the around 274 million citizens of the world’s third-largest democracy and largest Muslim-majority nation on the globe.

Indonesia, part of the G-20 group of the world’s top economies, has a significant place in Southeast Asia, where it remains a pivotal figure in the battle for power playing out between US and China.

It will have a new president as the incumbent Joko Widodo, popularly known as Jokowi, will hand over power in October after two five-year terms.

There are three main candidates for his successor – current Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto, Ganjar Pranowo and Anies Baswedan.

However, pre-poll surveys show none of them is above the 50% mark needed to claim the coveted post.

Prabowo lost twice to Widodo in the 2014 and 2019 elections.

The 72-year-old former military general represents the Gerindra Party, and has Jokowi’s eldest son, Gibran Rakabuming Raka, 36, as his running mate for vice-president.

Gibran is current mayor of Surakarta, a city locally known as Solo.

Ganjar, 55, is from Jokowi’s Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), and has former top security minister Mahfud MD, 66, as his running mate.

He was the governor of the Central Java province between 2013 and 2023, before which he was a parliamentarian.

And Ganjar has the backing of Megawati Sukarnoputri, the daughter of Indonesia’s first president, Sukarno, and leader of the PDI-P.

The third pair is of Anies, who is from the Nasdem Party, and Muhaimin Iskandar, the 57-year-old leader of the National Awakening Party, Indonesia’s largest Muslim political party.

Anies, a 54-year-old academic educated in the US, is a former governor of the capital Jakarta, as well as a former education minister.

- Second joint presidential, parliamentary polls

Indonesia has over 17,000 islands, where around 106 million registered voters are under age 40.

Hundreds of thousands of officials will oversee the polls, scheduled to take place across 38 provinces of the archipelago nation.

At least 18 national political parties and six regional parties are contesting the elections.

There are some 20,000 administrative posts up for grabs during the elections.

This is the second time after 2019 that Indonesia will hold presidential and parliamentary elections simultaneously.

Unofficial results or trends should be available within 24 hours, but the General Elections Commission will release official results in next 35 days.

At the federal level, Indonesians will vote to elect 575 members of the lower house of parliament, known as the People’s Consultative Assembly.

- Runoff expected

If no candidate wins over 50% in the world’s largest single-day election, a runoff is scheduled for June, with the next president due to take office in October.

Ubedilah Badrun, an Indonesian sociopolitical analyst, told Anadolu that he predicts that the elections “will have two rounds.”

“Because all survey results show that no one received electability above 50%,” Badrun said in a text message.

He believes Prabowo and Anies “will enter the second round.”

“After that, who will win is very difficult to predict,” he said.

It will be critical to see who Ganjar Pranowo’s supporters end up backing, while “Megawati’s influence … (also remains) very important in the second round.”

Election campaigning came to a halt last Saturday as the three candidates ended with promises to address spiraling living costs.

Current projections show Prabowo as the leading candidate, with the backing of a coalition of other parties including Golkar and the National Mandate Party (PAN).

Prabowo and Gibran have promised to continue Jokowi’s policies on economic growth, including moving the capital from Jakarta to Nusantara on the island of Borneo.

Ganjar and Mahfud have support from the United Development Party (PPP), the People’s Conscience Party (Hanura) and the Indonesian Unity Party (Perindo).

The duo claims they “understand the people of Indonesia.”

Pledging to work for a “just and prosperous” Indonesia, the pair of Anies and Muhaimin have been backed by the NasDem party and another Muslim party, the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS).

- ‘Growing and maturing democracy’

Mardani Ali Sera, a two-time lawmaker, told Anadolu that the elections in Indonesia are a sign of “a growing and maturing democracy.”

Mardani represents the PKS and is in the run for a third term in parliament.

He said that while Indonesia has seen infrastructure growth in past two decades, these elections and their results will be “significant as we are trying to get out from the (list of) middle-income countries.”

“Indonesia has huge natural resources, (now) we need a better human resource,” he said over the phone.

Mardani agreed with the analyst Badrun that there are “not any specific numbers (indicating) that one contestant was exceeding the 50% mark.”

In case of a second round, Mardani predicted that the pair of Anies and Muhaimin, whom his PKS party is supporting, is “likely to win.”

“Because Ganjar Pranowo will extend support to us,” he claimed.