Islamists in the Indonesian elections... How are their votes distributed and what is the performance of their parties?

Members of the Islamic Justice and Welfare Party at an election festival for candidate Anis Baswedan (Al Jazeera)

Jakarta -

The Indonesian arena is witnessing tensions to win the votes of followers of Islamic movements, estimated to number in the tens of millions, between members and supporters, in preparation for the legislative and presidential electoral battle on February 14, where negotiations and the formation of alliances are taking place in full swing.

The percentage of votes obtained by Islamic parties, regardless of their orientations, during the previous legislative elections combined was (40.83%) in the 1955 elections, (36.78%) in the 1999 elections, (38.35%) in the 2004 elections, and (28.62%). In the 2009 elections, (31.41%) in the 2014 elections, and (30.05%) in the last 2019 elections.

Various alliances and candidates compete to win the votes of followers of Islamic movements in Indonesia (party pages)

Three alliances

Islamic parties or parties with a religious historical background were distributed among the three alliances that were formed to run in the legislative and presidential elections. The “Change for Unity” alliance, which carries a critical discourse and seeks economic, legal, political and service reform, is nominated by Anis Baswedan, the former governor of the Indonesian capital, Jakarta.

This alliance witnesses the presence of 3 Islamic parties: she:

• The Opposition Justice and Welfare Party, which remained in opposition during the rule of current President Joko Widodo, has its own movement and intellectual movement that began to appear since the 1990s.

• In addition to the "Nahdat al-Watan Party", which represents significant sectors of the Nahdlat al-Ulama movement, and is the party for which Abdul-Muhaymin Iskandar, head of the party, is running for the position of vice president, along with Anis Baswedan.

• A third, small Islamic party is the newly founded “Umma” Party, and its message criticizes the current situation, and it is linked to the personality of the President of the People’s Consultative Council and the former President of the Muhammadiyah Association, Amin al-Rais.

The above three parties are allied with the National Democratic Party, headed by Surya Baloh, who was part of the ruling coalition, but disagreed with its president at the time of presidential nominations.

As for the Indonesia Progress Alliance, it includes the national "Amanah" party, which is historically linked to the Muhammadiyah Association, but no longer represents it, and has become a pragmatic party open to various trends, and the "Indonesian People's Wave" party, which was recently founded by the well-known politicians Anis Matta and Fakhri Hamzah, and is participating in the elections for the first time. And the “Crescent and Star” party, which is a historical party with a limited presence.

Each alliance is keen to have a party with a religious character, to win the votes of conservatives, traditionalists and Islamists, whether in the countryside or cities, until the third alliance of the Struggle for Democracy Party, with a leftist nationalist orientation, led by former President Megawati Soekarnoputri.

Alongside Gangar Pranowo, the governor of Central Java, Mohamed Mahfud, the former president of the Constitutional Court, who is from the Nahdlatul Ulama movement, was nominated for the presidency, in addition to the presence of the United Development Party, which is an old traditional religious party, and was the only umbrella for the votes of conservatives and religious people during the era of former President Suharto, but it is suffering. Old age and absence in favor of the presence of many other Islamic parties since 1998.

It is clear from the distribution of these parties that there are no longer pure alliances of the nationalist, leftist, or secular movement, and others bearing a religious or Islamic character, especially with the organization of legislative and presidential elections at the same time.

Each movement needs the votes of others to succeed in the presidential elections, which forces the presidential candidates and their allies to form coalitions with diverse orientations and places of influence, which means that the Islamist votes will be distributed according to the distribution of these parties and the orientations of the prominent Islamic figures who support this or that candidate.

The decline of (ideology) and the rise of (pragmatism) in the behavior of Indonesian political parties (party pages)

Discrepancy between Islamists

Director of the Center for Policy Research at the Indonesian Research and Innovation Authority, Dr. Ferman Nour said, “As in the past elections, the votes of the followers of the Muhammadiyah Association and the Nahdlatul Ulama, the largest Islamic community associations, were attracted and attempted to be won by various alliances and candidates,” pointing to the competition between some of the leaders of the same movement themselves, as happened with the Nahdlatul Ulama, with some of them trying to direct their followers towards... specific filter.

In his interview with Al Jazeera Net, Ferman added that the candidates went to religious institutes to win the votes of their disciples and sheikhs, but it is difficult for a particular candidate to win all the votes of Nahdlat al-Ulama’s followers, as the sheikhs of Nahda and their disciples have different political orientations, and Ennahdha’s votes have always been shared by different parties since the era of the president. Suharto is the first to date.

As for the Muhammadiyah Association, the second largest Islamic association, it did not explicitly declare a position in support of a party or one of the candidates. This happens in the absence of a candidate for the presidency or vice presidency who is a graduate of Muhammadiyah, which means that the votes of its followers may be shared by several parties. Among them are: Justice and Welfare, the National Secretariat, the United Development Party, and the Umma Party, which figures from the Muhammadiyah Movement recently participated in founding.

Competition between alliances and candidates to win the votes of Nahdlatul Ulama and Muhammadiyah followers (party pages)

More pragmatic

Although figures from Muhammadiyah had participated in establishing the “National Amanah” Party in 1998 based on a recommendation issued at the meeting of the “Enlighten Muhammadiyah” Council at that time, while maintaining Muhammadiyah as an independent community organization, and not turning it into a political party, the leaders of the National Amanah Party Today they do not define themselves as a party of Muhammadiyah, and have become a very open party.

In the opinion of Dr. Ferman Noor said that the Indonesian parties, including the religious ones, have become “more flexible and pragmatic,” saying that “the Islamic parties want to win a portion of the nationalist votes, while the nationalist parties want to get closer to Islamic circles. In fact, the nationalist parties no longer talk about secularism, but rather use approaches It is described as religious nationalism.”

Ferman Nour sees this situation as “somewhat positive for democracy, as there is some flexibility in political practice, and an effort by each party to understand the other and contain differences, and this is a good thing in cohesion in a pluralistic country, but what is worrying is that if the partisan situation is loose... The lack of ideology can generate pragmatism, and if it is not rationalized, we may lack morality, as is the case today.”

Indonesian parties, including religious parties, are more flexible and pragmatic in an effort to win votes from various factions (party pages)

Non-uniform “agenda”.

Khair Al-Salim bin Sabri, director of the Center for Islamic and Social Studies - in the Jog Jakarta region in the center of the Indonesian island of Java - believes that there is no unified political agenda among Islamic voters, as some of them are linked to groups, and others are not affiliated with any movement.

He says that the political agendas of the Islamic community organizations themselves differ internally due to their large number. There are, apart from Muhammadiyah and Ennahda, many other associations. Such as the Islamic Union, Al-Khairat, Al-Irshad, the Nation’s Renaissance, Al-Wasila, Islamic Unity, God’s Guidance, and others, whose history extends over decades.

Ben Sabri said that political issues in the Islamic community have always changed from time to time, but today there is no Islamic political agenda that a specific presidential candidate speaks about clearly, and in his opinion, “there is officially no candidate for the position of president, or his deputy, who has an explicit political discourse regarding Islam.” Most of the discourse is related to democracy and common public issues.”

According to Ben Sabri’s description, “The political discourse related to the Islamization of the state or Sharia law is almost absent from the speeches of the candidates for the legislative councils, including the candidates of the Justice and People’s Wave parties and other Islamic parties. They realize that this discourse will not be in their interest in terms of winning votes.”

He concluded his speech by saying, "We notice that the political approaches of Islamic politicians have become more fluid, but this does not mean that this agenda has completely disappeared, as the tendency toward those trends is still present."

Source: Al Jazeera