The race for the top post in the nation’s capital is on.

Three pairs of candidates had registered at the Jakarta General Elections Commission (KPUD) when the poll body closed registration on Friday night.

Incumbent Governor Basuki “Ahok” Tjahaja Purnama and Deputy Governor Djarot Saiful Hidayat will compete against the Anies Baswedan-Sandiaga Uno and Agus Harimurti Yudhoyono-Sylviana Murni tickets, which were announced at the 11th hour.

As the election has turned out to be a three-way race, it is expected to be a two-round contest as none of the candidates are seen as strong enough to garner more than 50 percent of the vote to win the February election, as stipulated by the 2007 Law on the Jakarta administration.

The Kinship Coalition, which was set up to unseat Ahok, failed to agree on a single candidate and dropped its plan to defeat the incumbent in a head-to-head race.

The Gerindra Party and the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) insisted on nominating former culture and education minister Anies Baswedan and businessman Sandiaga Uno. The other members of the coalition— the Democratic Party, the National Mandate Party (PAN), the National Awakening Party (PKB) and the United Development Party (PPP)—refused to back Anies and came up with their own candidates: Agus, the son of Dems chairman Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, and Sylviania, Ahok’s assistant for tourism.

“We didn’t reject Sandi or Anies. But Sandi had been declared by Gerinda and the PKS, and we were not involved in the decision-making process. Anies also got a lukewarm response from our coalition,” Dems deputy chairman Syarif Hasan said.

Anies attended the Dems’ presidential convention for the 2014 election. The party, which had a lackluster performance in the 2014 legislative election, ended up not nominating anyone. Anies then joined the campaign team for Joko “Jokowi” Widodo, who was then still serving as Jakarta governor.

Anies’ nomination also came as a surprise as he is now backed by the political parties he fought against in the 2014 polls. He also crushed the hopes of former law and human rights minister Yusril Ihza Mahendra, who announced his gubernatorial bid long before Anies.

 “Gerindra and the PKS had been trying to find figures that would be ready to serve [the city]. Anies and Sandiaga are neither Gerindra nor PKS members, but that wasn’t taken into consideration. We want candidates that can make changes in the city,” said Gerindra chairman Prabowo Subianto, who lost the presidential election to Jokowi.

Political analyst from the Indonesian Institute of Science (LIPI), Siti Zuhro, said the Jakarta election had become a battleground for political heavyweights: Yudhoyono, Prabowo and PDI-P chairwoman Megawati Soekarnoputri. Whoever wins the race, she said, will get a golden ticket for the 2019 presidential election.

“It may be [a strategy] for the 2019 presidential election, because the parties’ important figures play important roles,” Siti said.

The latest polls have shown that the Ahok-Djarot pairing remains the ticket to beat, even though the polls say they would only secure around 40 percent of the vote in a head-to-head race.

Anies and Sandiaga have been touted as formidable contenders for Ahok. Both candidates have also been mentioned in many polls even though their electability ratings are still below that of the governor.

Despite his lack of experience, Agus, analysts said, could become the dark horse of the election.

“It is not about Agus. He is relatively new in politics compared to Ahok and Anies. But given his background as the son of a former president, his electability rating may soon soar,” Sirajudin Abas, a researcher at Jakarta-based Saiful Mujani Research and Consulting (SMRC), told The Jakarta Post on Friday.

Given that all the candidates, including Agus, have the opportunity to attract voters from different partisan and demographic divides, the election will likely have another cycle.“I am sure nobody, including Ahok, who has topped many of the recent surveys, will be able to secure the 50 percent plus one votes [required in order to for the election to go through just one cycle].”

A survey revealed by pollster Polltracking Indonesia last week showed that Anies would be a serious contender for Ahok if he was paired with Sandiaga. In a match-up scenario between Ahok-Djarot versus Anies-Sandiaga, Ahok was favored by 37.95 percent of 400 respondents that participated in the survey. That survey showed that Anies-Sandiaga was edging closer to Ahok-Djarot’s ranking with 36.38 percent of respondents having chosen them.

The survey also showed that under that head-to-head scenario, undecided voters amounted to 25.67 percent.

Polltracking Indonesia executive director Hanta Yudha said during the release of the survey that Anies might beat Ahok in the election given his current electability rating. He said that, unlike Ahok, who declared his bid to run in the election last year, Anies had only been mentioned recently and therefore had not done anything to lure voters.

“The number of undecided voters is also high. This may be a serious threat for Ahok,” Hanta said.

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