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The battle for second term
With voters spoiled by new parks, innovative festivals and improved infrastructure as well as better public services, the battle to secure their second term in the 2010 municipal election was won pretty easily by Jokowi and Rudy
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ith voters spoiled by new parks, innovative festivals and improved infrastructure as well as better public services, the battle to secure their second term in the 2010 municipal election was won pretty easily by Jokowi and Rudy.
Although the city's poverty remained high at over 10 percent, local residents seemed happy, particularly with Jokowi's populist approach to communicating with the public when he regularly visited communities.
In an interview with The Jakarta Post before the April 2010 municipal election, Jokowi said that in order to provide for his people, a leader had to learn what they really needed by communicating with them and conducting surveys, instead of working at a desk.
Jokowi encouraged members of the public to voice their opinions through reporting stations, text messages, the city's Facebook page and through village, sub-district and city discussion groups.
'People are free to talk at village or city discussions. They sometimes speak harshly using strong language, but that's reality. Their feedback requires an immediate response,' he said, adding that public complaints meant services were inadequate.
Jokowi and Rudy's main rivals in the election were KP Eddy S Wirabhumi and his running mate, Supradi Kertamenawi, who were supported by the Democratic Party and Golkar Party.
His rivals, however, had a handicap that turned out to be devastating: They were perceived as representing the Surakarta royal family, whose members were known to live in luxury and who were plagued by infighting and intrigue. Jokowi-Rudy secured a landslide 91 percent of the vote in the election while Eddy-Supradi received a mere 9 percent.
During the campaign, the harshest criticism launched by Eddy's camp was of Jokowi's decision to continue to fund the city's soccer club, Persis Solo, from the public budget. They claimed this was a waste of taxpayers' money, given the club's consistently poor performance in the Indonesian league.
A graft case implicating the Sanitation and Parks Agency head, Satriya Teguh Subroto, was also used to attack the Jokowi's camp, but to no avail.
- Sita W. Dewi and Kusumasari Ayuningtyas
