Jakarta Governor Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama has vowed to declare himself as an independent candidate for the 2017 Jakarta Gubernatorial Election.

Teman Ahok (Friends of Ahok), a group of supporters that have helped Ahok in the lead up to his independent candidacy, had previously declared that Ahok may announce his candidacy in May.

"It could be faster than May. It could be next week or two weeks from now," Ahok told journalists at City Hall on Thursday.

Teman Ahok has gathered 760,000 Jakarta-based identity cards, surpassing the 532,000 requirement set by the General Election Commission. Ahok had hoped to gather 1 million.

Ahok has no political party affiliation at present, having quit the Gerindra Party which endorsed him in the 2012 Jakarta Election.

While he had recently made an approach to several other political parties, Ahok voiced his plan to meet with the Nasdem Party chairman Surya Paloh and Wiranto, head of the Hanura Party.

Nasdem have expressed support for Ahok'€™s plan to run as an independent for a second term while Hanura has yet to officially declare support for any potential candidate.

Ahok previously implied a willingness to gain support from the ruling PDI-P Party, although no details have been announced with regard to anything concrete.

Jakarta General Election Commission chairman Sumarno said that, although there were no official dates as yet, Jakarta Gubernatorial Election (KPUD) steps would commence in April with public promotion of the election, as reported by kompas.com.

KPUD would then start to collect and verify the identity card data garnered by independent candidates. In August, both independent and party-affiliated candidates may register their candidacy. KPUD would proceed to announce the official candidates in September. A  campaign term will be conducted henceforth, before voting begins in February 2017.(+)

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