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Campaigns zero in on millennials
With voting day for the 2019 general elections only three weeks away, the presidential candidates have started to ramp up their campaign efforts, targeting young voters who they hope will show up to the polling stations on April 17
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With voting day for the 2019 general elections only three weeks away, the presidential candidates have started to ramp up their campaign efforts, targeting young voters who they hope will show up to the polling stations on April 17.
Making up nearly half of the electorate, millennial voters have been prioritized by the Joko “Jokowi” Widodo-Ma’ruf Amin and Prabowo Subianto-Sandiaga Uno campaign teams since the early campaign days.
However, the young generation’s disinterest in politics, coupled with low voter turnouts in past elections, make it perhaps the hardest group to impress.
The incumbent, Jokowi, a late baby boomer born in 1961, started Monday by visiting young entrepreneurs in Banyuwangi, East Java, during which he shared with them his experience of expanding his furniture business long before he built his political career.
“Young people often complain about the capital and business opportunities, but the truth is we will get them both if we gain the trust of bankers and consumers,” he told the group. “When I first started my business, the only capital I had was trust.”
Donning his trademark white shirt, Jokowi encouraged and gave advice to them about growing their businesses, telling them to focus on strong product branding, utilize online marketplaces to attract more customers and work hard to maximize existing opportunities.
Voter turnout in Indonesia has been traditionally high with the abstention rate having gradually increased since the 1999 general election. In the 2014 presidential election, however, 30.42 percent of registered voters abstained and younger voters made up the majority of the abstentions.
As in past elections, there are concerns that young voters would not go to the polling stations because of a lack of interest in any of the candidates.
Moreover, April 17, the day when the legislative and presidential polls open this year, is only days before Good Friday, when people commonly go on vacation.
In campaign rallies in front of thousands on Monday, Jokowi conveyed his main message to youngsters, calling on them to make the effort to vote come election day.
“April 17, 2019, is a time that will define the future course of this nation, so please exercise your voting rights and ask [everyone] around you to come to the polling booths,” Jokowi said on Monday.
“Let’s flock to the polling stations wearing white shirts, shall we?” Jokowi said, receiving loud cheers from his supporters.
A survey released by Jakarta-based pollster Charta Politika on Monday showed Jokowi-Ma’ruf in the lead with 53.6 percent of the vote, while Prabowo-Sandiaga had 35.4 percent.
Jokowi-Ma’ruf leads in all age groups but their lead is smallest among those aged 21 to 35, a group often identified as Generation Y or millennials.
About 50.4 percent of respondents in the age group said they would vote for the incumbent, compared to 53.6 percent of total respondents.
Charta Politika executive director Yunarto Wijaya attributed the smaller lead to the tendency of young people to look for new things. “In any country, in presidential or regional head elections, young people tend to prefer the challengers, because they bring up new issues and symbolize change,” he said.
The selection of businessman Sandiaga, who is a member of Generation X as he was born in 1969, might favor Prabowo as it stood in stark contrast to Jokowi’s selection of 76-year-old Muslim cleric Ma’ruf, Yunarto said.
Sandiaga is the youngest candidate of the presidential and vice-presidential candidates and closer in age to millennials.
Courting the millennial vote appeared to be Sandiaga’s main goal on Sunday, when he talked about entrepreneurship and lowering the youth unemployment rate before the participants of the 2019 Young Entrepreneur Summit in Sragen, Central Java.
While Prabowo talked about economic development in Papua, Sandiaga held campaign rallies in Jakarta on Monday to reach out to voters from the millennial generation, their campaign team’s spokesperson Andre Rosiade said.
Former president Abdurrahman “Gus Dur” Wahid’s daughter Yenny Wahid, who is a key figure in the Jokowi camp, acknowledged that millennials were often ignorant and apolitical, hence the camp’s decision to focus on approaching them.
“Many of the millennials are swing and undecided voters,” Yenny said, “It’s possible that they just don’t want to reveal their choices yet, but they are willing to participate in the election.”
