The 2018 regional elections in West, Central and East Java will be key to securing victory in 2019 legislative and presidential elections.
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Kompas/Wisnu Widiantoro
General Election Commission (KPU) officials check registration documents for political parties at the KPU office in Jakarta on Monday (20/11). The commission has approved the applications of nine political parties to contest the 2019 general elections.
JAKARTA, KOMPAS – The 2018 regional elections in West Java, Central Java and East Java will be key to securing victory in both the legislative and presidential elections in 2019, as around 48 percent of voters are in those three provinces. Thus parties are preparing strategies to win the regional elections in the three provinces.
For example, in the regional election in Central Java, the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), who is allowed to put forward its own candidate because it has 31 out of 100 seats in the Central Java Legislative Council, is busy sifting through names of prospective candidates. There are five people who have been nominated as candidates for governor by the party. They are incumbent governor Ganjar Pranowo, Kudus regent Musthofa Sukoharjo regent Wardoyo Wijaya, executive council chairman of PDI-P Klaten regency Sunarna and chief of Tratemulyo village in Kendal regency Lestariono Loekito.
“Surveys will reveal who is most popular. We will give the results to the central executive board (DPP), then the DPP will decide,” said PDI-P Central Java regional executive council (DPD) secretary Bambang Kusriyanto, on Monday.
Meanwhile, the candidates for Central Java governor from the Great Indonesian Movement (Gerindra) party have been narrowed down to two people, Gerindra deputy chairman Ferry Juliantono and former Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Sudirman Said.
“As of today, there has not been a decision on who will be nominated as governor. The recommendation is likely to be announced in December.” said Gerindra Central Java DPD secretary Srriyanto Saputro.
Other parties are currently also considering the candidates they will nominate in the Central Java regional election.
The picture is clearer in East Java. The National Awakening Party (PKB) and PDI-P will nominate Saifullah Yusuf and Abdullah Azwar Anas as candidates for governor and deputy-governor. Saifullah is currently the East Java deputy governor, while Azwar Anas is Banyuwangi regent.
Social Affairs Minister Khofifah Indar Parawansa, who, according to reports, will put herself forward as a candidate for East Java governor is in talks with supporting parties to decide who she will be paired with as candidate for deputy governor.
Khofifah, who is also the chairwoman of Nadhlatul Ulama Muslimat, did not clarify when asked about the declaration of candidate pairing set to take place this month. “I did not say [the declaration] will be this month [November]. We will first discuss the matter with the nominating parties,” Khofifah said.
In West Java, a number of parties, including Golkar Party, have declared their nomination of Bandung mayor Ridwan Kamil. However, Golkar Party Region I Election Victory Coordinator Nusron Wahid said his party has opened the opportunity for nominations in a number of regions. ‘In politics everything can change,” he said.
Connection
Panji Anugrah Permana, a political science lecturer at University of Indonesia, Jakarta, said this is not the first time that there was a connection between the regional elections and the legislative election. In the 2008 East Java election, the Democrat Party strategized to win votes in the 2009 legislative election, facing two parties with a stronghold in East Java, PDI-P and PKB.
In the 2018 East Java election, Panji said there was a similar feeling of competitiveness in regards to securing votes in the legislative election. This is evident in the Democrat Party’s nomination of Khofifah, who is going head-to-head with the PDI-P and PKB, who are nominating Saifullah Yusuf.
In Central Java, Panji said, the position of PSI-P, who nominated President Joko Widodo in 2014, as the main party is relatively safe. In West Java, meanwhile, there is a fight between parties connected to the 2019 presidential election. However, he reminded that the voters’ decision in the legislative and regional elections may not have a direct correlation with their choices in the presidential election.
Mada Sukmajati, a politics and administration department lecturer at Gadjah Mada University, Yogyakarta, said it is not certain that whoever gets the most votes in Central Java, West Java and East Java will also win the legislative and presidential elections. He said that it is the simultaneous nature of the elections that make the results difficult to predict.
“Of course it will have an effect, but whether or not it will be significant will depend on the extent to which the elected governor and heads of regions mobilize for the presidential election, as well as for parties and their candidates in the legislative elections,” he said.
