Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) may reprise its role as a key player in the 2024 election, as presumptive presidential candidates and the parties that back them court the country’s largest Muslim organization for its supporter base, despite chairman Yahya Cholil Staquf’s refusal to allow the group to take an overt political position.

Months before the official start of campaign season, calls have grown louder for parties to choose NU-affiliated figures as vice presidential candidates on their tickets, which some believe could be decisive at the ballot box next year.

But the NU chairman, known colloquially as Gus Yahya, has sought to keep a buffer between religious affiliation and electoral politics, with NU and Muhammadiyah, the nation’s two biggest Muslim groups, denouncing the familiar brand of identity politics that has left the nation divided in past elections.

“I’ve always maintained that we don’t want Islam-based identity politics, or even NU-based identity politics,” Gus Yahya told reporters in Central Jakarta on Thursday.

“We don’t want to see a [candidate] running just because they’re from NU. What we want is someone to run because they genuinely have something rational to offer.”

The Muslim leader later clarified his statement, saying that if NU figures were to run for office, their candidacies had to be based on their own track records and credibility. They must not use their NU identity as “political capital”, he added.

Despite Gus Yahya’s apparent desire to keep NU clear of electoral politics, other figures within the organization have expressed support for potential NU candidates.

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