Conventional wisdom has it that, except for oppositional figurehead Anies Baswedan, the 2024 presidential election is a fight for the support of the 80 percent of voters who, according to surveys, think President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo has done a good job.

In the last few months, the two frontrunners, Prabowo Subianto and Ganjar Pranowo, have both been emphatically presenting themselves to voters as the candidate who embodies the leadership qualities of the highly popular incumbent. The logic is that whoever gets endorsed by Jokowi or is thought to be like him in terms of their character or ideology, will prevail on election day next year.

Clearly, neither Prabowo nor Ganjar is anything like Jokowi. The former Surakarta mayor captured the public imagination when he first stepped foot in the capital to contest the 2012 Jakarta gubernatorial election, presenting himself not only as a can-do, technocratic, no-nonsense leader who would get things done, but, more importantly, as a man of the people. Within less than two years, his electability rates in various political surveys soared above 40 percent, leaving his rivals in the dust.

As Jokowi’s rival in the last two elections, Prabowo has been seen as the antithesis of Jokowi, with foreign observers often describing the relationship between the two as a “study of contrast”. Ganjar, meanwhile, is largely viewed as a flawed version of Jokowi. The Central Java governor has done many of the things that Jokowi did in 2012 and 2014, going on blusukan (impromptu visits) and gathering cybertroopers to support his election bid. But, unlike Jokowi, Ganjar is largely considered arrogant, even by fellow members of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P). In short, he lacks Jokowi’s humble, down-to-earth character traits that make him a man of the people.  

This leaves Prabowo and Ganjar’s fates entirely at the mercy of Jokowi, who is expected to decide between the two. Both candidates’ electability ratings are currently hovering between 30 and 35 percent, and it is not clear who the frontrunner is given the small margins.   

Jokowi has been sending mixed signals over his political preference. Jokowi is still a PDI-P politician, which should make him, at least formally, a supporter of Ganjar. But the President has also made several public appearances with Prabowo, creating the impression that he is secretly rooting for his defense minister. Despite, or because of, the ambiguity, both sides have claimed to have Jokowi’s full support.

The question now is whether Jokowi will ever endorse one of the presidential nominees, a political decision that many believe would be game changing for the election.

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