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NasDem stays in Cabinet as Jokowi hedges bets
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President Joko “Jokowi“ Widodo (left) and NasDem Party chairman Surya Paloh talk during a meeting on Nov. 22, 2018. (Antara/Yudhi Mahatma)
D
espite weeks of speculation that President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo would dismiss NasDem ministers from the Cabinet in response to the party’s 2024 electoral posture, no announcement of the sort has come from Merdeka Palace.
Analysts say this could be a sign that the President is hedging his bets with regard to opposition figure Anies Baswedan, whom NasDem has backed for the presidency in 2024.
On a visit to Surakarta, Central Java, on Sunday, State Secretary Pratikno maintained that while it was the President’s prerogative to reshuffle the Cabinet as he wished, he had no immediate plans to do so.
“No plans [for a reshuffle yet], but it could happen this month or next month,” said Pratikno, as quoted by CNN Indonesia.
Previously, President Jokowi hinted that a reshuffle could be announced on Feb. 1, which coincided with a day known as Pon Wednesday on the Javanese calendar. The President has made Cabinet shake-up announcements on Pon Wednesdays before, which Javanese tradition holds as particularly auspicious days.
Rumors of a Cabinet reshuffle started to emerge after NasDem declared its support for popular opposition figure Anies in October 2022. The decision caused NasDem, a member of the government coalition, to face a flurry of criticism from the ruling Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), of which President Jokowi is a member.
But after Pon Wednesday came and went without news of a reshuffle, political analyst Bawono Kumoro of pollster Indikator Politik speculated that the President could be reconsidering his stance after meeting with NasDem chairman Surya Paloh on Jan. 26.
