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Analysis: Tale of two Islam-based parties in Team Anies
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DKI Jakarta Governor Anies Baswedan became the inspector of the ceremony at Monas, Central Jakarta, Tuesday (09/17/19). The ceremony was held in commemoration of National Transportation Day. (JP/Rafaela Chandra/Adi)
Two Islam-based parties could not be more different than the National Mandate Party (PKB) and the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), yet they have joined hands in nominating former Jakarta governor Anies Baswedan as their presidential candidate for next year’s election. Should Anies goes on to win, the PKB and PKS will be fighting it out in determining the extent to which Islam is going to be a factor in influencing the policies of the new government.
Both parties were founded in 1998 immediately after Indonesia ushered in democracy following the downfall of strongman Soeharto. The PKS has since become the leading political party in mainstreaming Islam into the country’s political agenda, and many of its supporters aspire to turn Indonesia into an Islamic state and for sharia to become the law of the land. The PKB, founded by Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), the country’s largest Islamic mass organization, on the other hand is bent on keeping Indonesia pluralist and inclusive, putting it at odds often with the PKS and other parties with an Islamist agenda.
The PKB will likely be the bigger partner than than PKS in a future coalition government since its chairman Muhaimin Iskandar has secured for himself the slot as Anies’ running mate. In fact, Muhaimin made his nomination for vice president a condition for the PKB joining Team Anies. In past elections, the PKB has dominated in East Java, the second-largest constituency where Anies is perceived to be weak. But whether the PKB will deliver East Java on election day on Feb. 14, 2024 is another question, given the ongoing feuds within the PKB, and between the PKB and NU.
The PKS had also earlier vied for the vice-presidential slot and was among the first parties to endorse Anies’ nomination, along with the NasDem Party and the Democratic Party. When Anies announced Muhaimin as the running mate this month, the Democratic Party quit the coalition in haste, disappointed that its chair Agus Harimurti Yudhoyono did not get the slot.
The PKS knew better than to push its own nominee in the absence of any viable candidate, but It took several days before the party endorsed the Anies-Muhaimin ticket. When it announced its decision at a meeting on Sep. 16, attended by both candidates, the pleasantries exchanged between Muhaimin and PKS president Ahmad Syaikhu concealed the major differences in how they each see the role of Islam in politics.
Neither the PKS nor the PKB are ever in the top-three largest parties, which usually go to nationalist-secular parties, but they have taken part in coalition governments to influence policies. In the 2019 legislative elections, the PKB came fourth with 9.69 percent of the total vote, while the PKS came sixth with 8.21 percent of the vote, enough to make impacts on some policies, either in the coalition government or in opposition in the House of Representatives.
The PKB has been part of both coalition governments of President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo, in 2014-2019 and from 2019 to the present, and was a member of the coalition government under then president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono in 2009-2014. The PKS served in both coalition governments under Yudhoyono in 2004-2009 and 2009-2014.
