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Presidential hopefuls make foray into luring young voters
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A girl uses her mobile phone in front of an Indonesian election campaign mural ahead of the polls at Banda Aceh, Aceh province, on March 17, 2019. Just like the 2019 election, the young population will again become the majority of voters in the 2024 presidential race. (AFP/Chaideer Mahyuddin)
Wo:p>With the official start of the campaign season less than four months away, presidential hopefuls have begun drawing up plans and holding dialogues with young voters in hopes of making themselves more appealing to the age group, which is widely tipped to be key in winning next year’s election.
According to the General Elections Commission (KPU), 106 million voters, or around 52 percent of the 204 million total eligible voters, are considered young people, or those younger than 40. A closer look at the voter roll shows that a third of all registered voters are millennials, while a further 22 percent belong to Generation Z, or those born in the late 1990s and onward.
With public opinion polls showing that there is only a little electability gap between presidential frontrunners Ganjar Pranowo of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) and Prabowo Subianto of the Gerindra Party, their camps, as well as political parties backing opposition figurehead Anies Baswedan, have begun their foray to win the hearts of Indonesian youths.
To this end, the PDI-P held on Saturday training sessions for 100 of its youth campaigners at the PDI-P’s own “political party school” in South Jakarta. PDI-P secretary-general Hasto Kristiyanto said in a statement that a team of campaign experts handpicked by President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo, dubbed "Team Seven", took part as one set of instructors for the two-day training session.
"Jokowi has finally sent his people [to teach our campaigners]. This has been the result [of his instruction to better educate our campaigners on] Ganjar’s style of leadership, history and personal values,” Hasto said on Saturday.
Read also: Parties draw up strategies to entice millenials, Gen Z
While it remains unclear who the seven members of the team are, Hasto said a branding expert, a communication expert and a humor expert, who had been instrumental in styling Jokowi’s own communication style, are on the team.
