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flurry of meetings involving senior leaders of opposition parties on Monday has resulted in a clearer picture on who will take on incumbent President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo in next year’s presidential election.

In a follow-up to a meeting last week, Gerindra Party chairman Prabowo Subianto and Democratic Party leader Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono sat down on Monday morning for a meeting in which they agreed to form a coalition that would nominate Prabowo at the top of the ticket.

“There is a willingness from both sides to create coordination [and] close cooperation to deal with multiple problems the country currently faces,” Prabowo told reporters after the two-hour meeting. “We have agreed to cooperate politically, which will, of course, be in the form of a coalition.”

Prabowo and Yudhoyono, two generals who rose through the rank of the Indonesian Military (TNI) during the New Order era, had met last Tuesday at the latter’s home in Kuningan, South Jakarta, where they said the door to a coalition between their two parties was “wide open”.

“This is the second meeting. In the first meeting, the door was wide open for Gerindra and the Democratic Party to form a coalition,” Yudhoyono said. “Now the door is even more open, and, God willing, we can come together to improve [the nation] in the next five years.”

Monday’s meeting did not discuss the possibility of Yudhoyono’s son Agus Harimurti getting the vice presidential slot. Yudhoyono said it was up to Prabowo to decide who should be his running mate.

“As the leader of the Democratic Party, I leave it completely to Pak Prabowo; the important thing is that [the VP candidate] has the support of the people and the capability to be a leader,” Yudhoyono said.

The former president also dismissed reports that Prabowo would quit the presidential race and support a new candidate.

Last Friday, Prabowo told an ulema gathering organized by the National Movement to Safeguard the Indonesian Ulema Council’s Fatwa (GNPF-MUI) that he was ready to throw his support behind another candidate if that was what the people wanted.

“We are here with the conviction that Pak Prabowo will be our presidential candidate,” Yudhoyono said.

Later on Monday, as a follow-up to his meeting with Yudhoyono, Prabowo met with executives of longtime Gerindra ally the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS).

PKS chairman Sohibul Iman said in the meeting that party executives had briefed Prabowo on the recommendation of the GNPF-MUI gathering that he should pick either PKS executive Salim Segaf al-Jufri or popular YouTube preacher Abdul Somad as his running mate in the 2019 election.

Sohibul also said three parties in the opposition coalition, namely Gerindra, the PKS and PAN, could accept the Democratic Party’s decision to join the fold.

On Monday evening, PKS executives also held a meeting with Yudhoyono.

A number of PKS politicians have warmed to the idea of the Democratic Party joining a coalition to challenge President Jokowi’s bid for reelection.

Between 2004 and 2014, the Muslim-based party joined the Democratic Party-led coalition backing the Yudhoyono administration.

Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) analyst Arya Fernandes said intensified meetings between opposition parties indicated they had reached a compromise on who would be Prabowo’s running mate.

PKS leaders had earlier said that the VP slot was “non-negotiable”, while it has been widely reported that Yudhoyono had been adamant that his son Agus should get the slot.

“The Democratic Party doesn’t want to be left behind [by Gerindra] for pushing Prabowo to pick one of their own as his running mate,” he said. “And once the Democratic Party softens its stance, it’s more likely that the PKS and PAN will also be less insistent, because all parties are now on an equal footing.”

Arya said Prabowo would soon announce his VP pick.

“Now all Prabowo has to do is ensure PAN and the PKS [stay in the coalition],” he said. “Once they all soften up and can sit together, we will see who the vice presidential candidate is.”