Simultaneous Election Gives Edge to Certain Political Parties

KOMPAS/WAWAN H PRABOWO

The two pairs of presidential and vice presidential candidates for the 2019 general election, Joko Widodo-Ma\'ruf Amin and Prabowo Subianto-Sandiaga Salahuddin Uno, share a light moment after the drawing of the election ballot numbers at the General Elections Commission (KPU) office on Jl. Imam Bonjol in Central Jakarta on Friday (21/09/2018) evening. At the public event, the duo of Joko Widodo and Ma’ruf got number 01 and Prabowo-Sandiaga got number 02.

JAKARTA, KOMPAS – Political parties associated with certain presidential and VP candidates may reap benefits from the 2019 general election. However, other political parties may still have a chance to win House of Representative seats.

The 2019 simultaneous elections, comprising legislative and presidential elections, will potentially benefit political parties that the public strongly associates with any of the presidential or vice presidential candidates. Nevertheless, many possibilities remain as the elections will not be held for another six months and many voters remain undecided.

The positive relationship between political parties and presidential or vice presidential candidates, commonly dubbed the coattail effect, was clearly seen in a Kompas survey held from Sept. 24 to Oct. 5.

In the survey with 1,200 respondents, the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), the Gerindra Party and the National Awakening Party (PKB) were the three top parties, with the PDI-P garnering 29.9 percent of “votes”, Gerindra 16 percent and PKB 6.3 percent.

The three parties’ high level of electability was closely linked to the figures running in next year’s presidential election, namely Joko Widodo-Ma’ruf Amin and Prabowo Subianto-Sandiaga Uno.

The PDI-P is closely associated with its member Jokowi, while Gerindra enjoys close association with Prabowo and Sandiaga. Prabowo is Gerindra’s current chairman while Sandiaga is its former deputy chief patron. Due to Ma’ruf’s background as an ulema, the public strongly associates him with the PKB.

In the survey, 20.4 percent of respondents were either still undecided or declined to disclose their political preference. Because of this, many possibilities remain wide open, including which political parties may win more votes than the 4 percent legislative threshold and, thereby, win House seats.

Taking into account the survey’s standard deviation of 2.8 percent, political parties with at least 1.2 percent of votes in the survey may still win House seats. These include the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), the United Development Party (PPP), the National Mandate Party (PAN) and the United Indonesia Party (Perindo).

Saiful Mujani Research and Consulting (SMRC) executive director Djayadi Hanan said on Monday (22/10/2018) that, based on theories and research results, political parties with members running in the presidential election would enjoy coattail effect. Therefore, it is understandable that both the PDIP and the Gerindra Party will enjoy higher electability than the other parties.

However, Djayadi continued, other parties might also enjoy a coattail effect, despite at a lower level than PDIP and Gerindra. These parties will need to work hard to associate themselves with the presidential or VP candidate that they support.

According to Djayadi, parties should not exert too much effort to obtain coattail effect in regions where the presidential or VP candidate they support have poor grass root support. It will be wiser if the parties’ legislative candidates in those regions are not campaigning for the presidential or VP candidate. Indeed, this strategy has been implemented by a number of political parties.

Strategy

Several political parties with members not running in the presidential election have begun to use the presidential candidate that they support in their campaigns.

In September, for instance, the PKS central board sent circulars to its members in legislative bodies to urge them to campaign for Sandiaga. “We urge all members of the PKS faction to deploy all resources that they have to initiate and optimize campaigns for VP candidate Sandiaga Uno in their respective constituencies,” the circular signed by PKS chair Sohibul Iman said.

PKS advisory council deputy head Hidayat Nur Wahid said that the circular was a form of PKS’s support on the Prabowo-Sandiaga ticket.

Separately, People’s Conscience Party (Hanura) secretary general Herry Lontung Siregar said that the party had instructed its legislative members to campaign for the Jokowi-Ma’ruf ticket. “We believe that [the relationship] will be mutually beneficial,” he said.

PKB executive Abdul Kadir Karding said the party hoped to attain the coattail effect from its similar election ballot number (number 1) as that of the Joko-Ma’ruf ticket (number 01). Furthermore, it is expected that Ma’ruf’s presence will help boost support from the ticket among the pesantren community.

Other political parties may also use Jokowi’s achievements to boost their campaigns. (GAL/REK/APA/AGE/SAN)