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Democracy's betrayal: When preventing the worst is no longer the priority
Jokowi is the protagonist behind the Prabowo-Gibran story, employing a soft, semi-authoritarian maneuver to emerge as the real winner of elections as a political game, with democracy the real loser.
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President Joko “Jokowi“ Widodo (left) and Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto shake hands on Feb. 19, 2024, during the inauguration of the Soedirman National Defense Central Hospital (RSPPN) in Pesanggrahan, South Jakarta. (AFP/Bay Ismoyo)
The likely victory of presidential pair Prabowo Subianto and Gibran Rakabuming Raka, respectively the defense minister and son of President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo, in the Feb. 14 election could mark one of the darkest episodes in the history of post-Reform Indonesia.
President Jokowi’s meddling and lobbying, or cawe-cawe in local parlance, is still fresh in our minds. He blatantly played with the system to stack the deck in favor of Prabowo-Gibran in the lead-up to the election: from the Constitutional Court’s controversial decision that allowed Gibran’s nomination as Prabowo's running mate to the appointment of over 200 acting regional heads, and from the mobilization of state apparatuses like the military, the police, civil service and village heads to support the pair and up to the politicization of the social assistance (Bansos) program and state resources.
All these maneuvers are highlighted in the documentary film Dirty Vote, released just three days before voting day.
The unholy circle behind Prabowo's apparent success presents a paradox regarding how the new administration will address stubborn issues such as corruption, collusion and nepotism.
However, what has infuriated many is that the patterns shown in the Prabowo-Gibran campaign strategy resemble those of Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr in the Philippines. First, Bongbong chose Sara Duterte, the daughter of outgoing president Rodrigo Duterte, as his running mate to form a strong alliance.
Prabowo-Gibran’s strategy in the 2024 election was more or less the same as Bongbong’s political rebranding that won him the Philippine presidency in 2022 with over 59 percent of the vote.
For instance, the Prabowo team has been using “gemoy”, which means cute and cuddly and is derived from the Indonesian word “gemas”, to describe the presidential candidate. Interestingly, Bongbong (BBM) and Sara also used "gemoy" as the name of their popular campaign, particularly in referring to the pair’s “BBM-Sara’s Dance Challenge”.
