More than 205 million are entitled to participate in Indonesia's elections (Al Jazeera Net)
Jakarta -
Indonesians went to vote on Wednesday morning in the sixth elections held by the country since the fall of the Suharto regime and the start of the new system based on democratic transformation.
Those who have reached the age of 17, who are more than 205 million voters, have the right to vote in more than 823 thousand polling stations to choose the president of the country and his deputy from among 3 presidential candidates and the same number for the position of representative, in addition to the representatives of the Central Parliament (580 representatives) and the Senate (136 representatives). And representatives of the regional parliaments (38 regions and 514 governorates and cities), with a total of 20 thousand representatives in all of these parliaments.
The voter votes on 5 large papers, each paper relating to one of the aforementioned elections, and is placed in 5 boxes in each electoral center, with the exception of Jakarta, where ballots are taken with four boxes, given that it is a region and a city at the same time.
Indonesians were anxious last Tuesday night, fearing that the heavy rains that fell throughout the night until dawn on Wednesday would prevent the elections from being held, but their cessation after dawn saved the electoral process, which is perhaps the most important since the 1999 elections, as it is being held amid strong competition between the three candidates: Anies Baswedan, Prabowo Subianto and Ganjar Pranowo, as arranged by the Electoral Commission. The Commission has traditionally assigned numbers to the presidential candidates and parties competing for the 24 central parliament by lottery.
The large numbers of polling stations reduced the crowding of voters, and therefore the Electoral Commission restricted voting between seven in the morning and one in the afternoon, according to the local time of each region (Jakarta time is six hours ahead of international Greenwich Mean Time), and due to the vast geography of Indonesia, the country is divided into 3 time zones, and The time difference between the east and west of the country is two hours.
Indonesia's elections took place in more than 823,000 polling stations (Al Jazeera Net)
Presidential elections
Current President Joko Widodo (known as Jokowi) has completed two terms in 10 years (2014-2024) and no longer has the right to run again. The current elections are witnessing 3 candidates within party alliances, and they are:
Anis Baswedan, governor of the capital (2017-2022) and former Minister of Education, and Abdel-Muhaymin Iskandar for the position of Vice President. He is the head of the Nahdat El Watan Party.
The Change Alliance carries messages and promises of change, reform, and achieving justice in the areas of managing the country, serving citizens, the judicial system, combating corruption, and providing the best to different segments of society.
This coalition includes 4 parties, a nationalist party and 3 Islamic parties, which are:
-
The National Democratic Party
, which left the ruling coalition.
- The
Islamic-leaning
Justice and Welfare Party
, which remained in opposition for about 10 years of the rule of current President Joko Widodo. –
Nahdat al-Watan Party
, which represents broad sectors of the audience of the traditional religious society Nahdlat al-Ulama.
-
The Umma Party
, a new Islamic opposition party whose presence is still limited.
Prabowo Subianto, head of the Grindura Party and the current Minister of Defense, who is running for the presidency for the fourth time since 2009, along with Rakabuming Raka (36 years old), the son of the current president and the governor of the city of Sulu-Gibran, for the position of vice president after amending an article in the electoral law regarding the minimum age of the candidate.
This coalition includes 8 parties, a mixture of national parties and those with an Islamic historical background.
–
Great Indonesia Movement Party
(Grindra), headed by Prabowo Subianto.
–
Golkar Party
, founded by former President Suharto.
–
Amanat National Party
.
-
Crescent and Star Party
.
-
The Democratic Party
, which is the party of former President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.
-
Indonesian People's Wave Party
(Glora), a new party.
–
Indonesia Solidarity Party
, another small party headed by Kaisang Pangarib, the second son of President Joko Widodo.
Gangar Pranowo, Governor of Central Java Province, and with him for the position of Vice President is Mohamed Mahfud, President of the Constitutional Court and former Coordinating Minister for Security, Political and Legal Affairs. The coalition includes 4 parties:
-
The Party of Struggle for Democracy
, headed by Megawati Sukarnoputri.
–
United Development Party
.
-
Indonesian People's Conscience Party
.
-
Indonesia Unity Party
.
The voter dyes his finger with ink to avoid voting again (Al Jazeera Net)
Legislative elections
24 parties are participating in the legislative elections, 18 parties at the national level, and 6 local parties in the autonomous province of Aceh. The party running for elections is required to have branches in all provinces of Indonesia, and 75% of the cities in those provinces. To enter Parliament, a party must obtain 4% of the voters' votes to be accepted.
If the vote rate of nearly 80% in the previous elections is repeated, each party will need approximately 6.5 million votes to cross the parliamentary threshold.
Fierce battle
What is striking is that the presidential and legislative elections take place on one day, even though they took place in this way in 2019, but it was a repeat of the 2014 scene in which the two same candidates, current President Joko Widodo and his current Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto, competed, so the element of excitement was absent from the electoral scene.
As for these elections, 3 candidates represent 3 political alliances, all of which have their weight. The three alliances include parties from all political and intellectual trends, Islamic, nationalist and leftist, which gives the elections a lot of excitement and challenge.
All opinion polls give the candidate Prabowo the largest share of the votes. According to the Indonesian Poll Center - a non-governmental center with high credibility - Prabowo will receive 51.9% of the votes, Anies will receive 23.3%, and Ganjar will receive 20.3%. The expectations of other polls do not differ from these percentages.
The large number of polling stations reduces voter crowding (Al Jazeera Net)
However, the intensity of polarization and the strength of the electoral campaigns that the country experienced during this month make many analysts expect to go to a second round of the presidential elections, due to the difficulty of Prabowo securing the required votes, which is 50% + 1 of the votes accepted from the first round.
Observers do not rule out the occurrence of surprises that will change the electoral scene, especially in light of the rising popularity of Anis and Ganjar in the electoral campaigns, due to their ability to address young people directly and through social media platforms, which was reflected in the large election festivals held by the three candidates on the last day of the campaign (last Saturday). ) before the electoral silence.
Observers believe that these elections are, in essence, a battle between the continuation of the ruling policy that has been in place for 10 years, and the expansion of the influence of the current President Jokowi, who is allied with the candidate Prabowo, and nominated his son as vice president, and a new ruling policy that aims for change, whether through Anis or Ganjar.
These observers believe that the elections have an international dimension, albeit indirectly, between Indonesia's continued openness to China economically through the Prabowo alliance, and the desire to consolidate the relationship with the United States through Anis, and secondly, Ganjar.
It is expected that tonight, local time, preliminary unofficial results will appear through polls conducted by research centers in the centers, and not through the Election Commission, which will announce the results after more than a month, after it receives complaints and appeals and decides on them before announcing the official result.
Source: Al Jazeera