T

he General Elections Commission (KPU) has announced that Joko “Jokowi” Widodo and his running mate, Ma’ruf Amin, won the presidential race against rival candidate pair Prabowo Subianto-Sandiaga Uno. Regardless of the latter’s efforts to challenge the election result, either politically or legally, Jokowi and Ma’ruf look certain to lead the country for the next five years.

Regrettably, following the KPU announcement riots erupted, notably in Jakarta, during which ardent supporters of Prabowo and Sandiaga vented their frustration, rampaging the capital city. They said the presidential election was systematically and massively rigged and consequently demanded the KPU to declare the result null and void.

The presidential election result is actually an anomaly, given the worrisome global political trend in which voters strongly tend to entrust far-right leaning candidates for their nationalistic, primordial and antiforeign political platforms.

According to Kristof Szombati in The Far Right in Government (2018), these are cases in point: Donald Trump in the United States, Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, Matteo Salvini in Italy, Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines, Narendra Modi in India, Jaroslaw Kaczynski in Poland, Victor Orban in Hungary, Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Turkey and Benyamin Netanyahu in Israel.

If the vox populi, vox dei dictum bears any truth, Indonesia should actually cherish the fact that it managed to avoid the entrapment of this far-right global trend, as the winning pair is known to embrace and pursue moderate and all-inclusive policies.

In spite of this encouraging phenomenon, it is worth noting that the KPU works are far from perfect, marred, among others, by inaccurate vote tallying, sloppy distribution of ballot boxes and papers, and, more distressingly, the death of more than 500 poll workers across the country. Their deaths are not only tragic, but also unacceptable, as they put their family interests behind the state duties.

In order to safeguard Indonesia’s path to a matured democracy — initially attempted in 1998 — it is incumbent upon the nation to review urgently the organization of the simultaneous presidential and legislative elections.

This should include but not be limited to the possibility of amending General Elections Law No. 7/2017, in order to redress the loopholes.

Arguably, this is the easiest part for the government to carry out, working in tandem with the House of Representatives.

The most enduring and painstaking endeavors will be how to reunite the nation, as the losing pair and its ardent supporters have refused to accept the fact that Jokowi-Ma’ruf have won the race.

The Prabowo-Sandiaga camp persistently tried to delegitimize the KPU prior to and immediately after its presidential election ruling. Worse still, its supporters started organizing a social disobedience movement, including violent protests, especially in Jakarta. World leaders and those concerned about Indonesia are now keenly observing the developments unfolding in the country, wanting to know where Indonesia will lead to.

If social unrest continues and widens nationwide, Indonesian attempts to become a matured democracy will be severely compromised.

No one will be able to predict where and when it will end. It is therefore high time for leaders of the nation to put aside their differences and summon all of their wisdom to immediately impose self-restraint and create a favorable environment to enable them to discuss and find a dignified solution to the current political impasse.

The door is still ajar to find a dignified solution, acceptable to both sides. And, if national unity is of utmost importance, both opposing camps should be able to explore all avenues, including the possibility of forming a “cohabitation government” — as opposed to confrontation.

Indonesia is not a liberal democracy, a system that operates on the basis of “the winner takes all” principle. This is not compatible with the state ideology, Pancasila, cognizant of the fact that its fourth principle denotes common endeavors, while Article 33 of the 1945 Constitution also carries values of similar nature.

The concept of cohabitation government is not alien in the political domain and has been practiced across the globe, among others in Sri Lanka, Lebanon, France, Georgia, Poland, Finland, Russia and Ukraine, with all its strengths and flaws.

In order to maintain national unity and political stability, cohabitation government may offer the best way forward for Indonesia, as the two powerhouses are solidly supported by 85,607,362 (55.5 percent) and 68,650,239 (44.5 percent) of voters respectively.

In the context of Indonesia’s contemporary politics, it is rather inconceivable not to take these vital statistics, hence political reality, into consideration in the formation of a new government. Failing to do so may compromise the national unity and political stability for, at least, five years to come.

The ability of Indonesian elites to harmonize these two confronting sides will definitely form a solid basis for Indonesia to develop further its economy in the midst of a lingering global economic crisis compounded further recently by protectionism, unilateralism and trade wars.

Confrontation is what Indonesia needs the least now in facing those formidable challenges. Cohabitation may instead offer Indonesia a palatable exit strategy to free itself from the current political gridlock.

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The writer served as Indonesian ambassador to Australia (2003-2005) and China (2010-2013).