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s the legislative election approaches, people are beginning to talk about those who will be contesting the presidential election '€” a warmer topic than the number of seats parties might secure in the House of Representatives. Even without knowing the results of the April 9 election, it is quite obvious that it will be a straight forward duel between current Jakarta Governor Joko '€œJokowi'€ Widodo and chief patron of the Gerindra Party Prabowo Subianto.

The two figures are polar opposites with regards to their background, careers, experiences and even appearance. Jokowi is modest, low profile, '€œdown to earth'€ and skinny. Prabowo is glamorous, high profile, strong, decisive and muscular. Let the people decide. But before that, their parties must work very hard to win at least 25 percent of the popular vote, or 20 percent of the seats in the House in order to put forward a presidential candidate on their own. Otherwise, the big match may be changed.

In every campaign rally, Prabowo is direct, critical and never hesitates to attack the current government and his rivals. Though he is a brilliant orator, he tends to lose his composure when directs verbal bombardments on his rivals. And while he tends to criticize through insinuation, everybody knows he is shooting bullets straight at heart of his strongest rival, which no doubt is Jokowi. Prabowo needs to show that he is the best choice. It is almost certain that he is burdened by the fact that most surveys always place his name behind the skinny man.

Prabowo is going all out to secure victory. At 62, he may well feel that it'€™s now or never. He made a dramatic entrance to the Gerindra rally in Gelora Bung Karno Stadium where he stood on a jeep to greet the party supporters, mounted a horse and rode around the stadium and paraded before the mesmerized party members. Like stage star, he showed his skills in riding a horse like a soldier in the cavalry in the battle field to excite the crowd prior to his speech. The rally was amusing, and the theatrics were actually quite impressive as it entertained the spectators. But, then we are left with the question: What was the purpose of the military style grandstanding? It might be that people are longing for a strong leader due to their dissatisfaction with President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono whom people labeled as a weak and indecisive leader or Mr. Doubtful.

Now by contrast Prabowo may be trying to give the impression that he is the complete opposite. His body language is that of a firm and decisive leader. However, Prabowo may have forgotten that our reformation mandate is to develop civil society, or that we are currently not at war. However, the actual war that we are facing today is against the rampant corruption which is putting our future at risk and oppresses our hope.

To win this war, we don'€™t need a leader who projects himself as a strongman by donning a military uniform and riding a horse. The show of force was actually a confirmation that if elected, he may govern the country using a military approach.

Indonesia has evolved into a functioning democracy and we don'€™t want to go back to the dark era of authoritarian rule. Regardless of how hard Prabowo tries to lure voters, he will never be able to separate himself from a dark period of Indonesia'€™s history in 1998.

Titus Jonathan
Serpong, Banten