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Golkar, PKB at loggerheads over Prabowo’s running mate
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One man one vote: A voter casts his ballot in a polling station in Banjar Blungbang, Penarungan village, in the Bali regency of Badung during the simultaneous legislative and presidential elections on April 17, 2019. (JP/Zul Trio Anggono)
As talks continue over who will be Prabowo Subianto’s running mate in the 2024 presidential election, the Gerindra Party on Saturday said that National Awakening Party (PKB) chair Muhaimin Iskandar was still the frontrunner for the slot, while the Golkar Party aimed to nominate chairman Airlangga Hartarto for the position.
“The 'golden ticket' is still in the hands of Muhaimin," Gerindra secretary-general Ahmad Muzani told reporters at the General Elections Commission (KPU) headquarters on Saturday, when the party registered its legislative candidates with the KPU.
Muzani underlined that as the PKB was so far the only party that had formalized its support for Gerindra, Muhaimin would be more than deserving to be the Gerindra chairman’s running mate.
Earlier in the day, Muhaimin affirmed his political ambitions, saying that he was forgoing running in the 2024 legislative election to run in the presidential race. “If it’s not as president, then it’s as vice president. Anything but a position within the [Presidential Advisory Board]," Muhaimin said on Saturday.
Currently one of the deputy speakers of the House of Representatives, Muhaimin has frequently spoken of his ambitions for higher office and he intensely campaigned to be President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo’s running mate in the 2019 presidential election, a position that eventually fell to the then-supreme leader of Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), Ma’ruf Amin.
The PKB currently makes up one half of the Great Indonesia Awakening Coalition (KKIR) with Gerindra, but Muhaimin is confident that Golkar will soon be joining the fold. Earlier this month, the PKB and Golkar came to an agreement in stitching together a so-called "grand alliance" of pro-government parties to back Prabowo as their presumptive presidential nominee with the two parties in the driver’s seat.
Golkar currently is the de facto leader of the United Indonesia Coalition (KIB) with the National Mandate Party (PAN) and the United Development Party (PPP). The fate of their alliance is in doubt however as the PPP has endorsed Central Java Governor Ganjar Pranowo of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P).
