Former Indonesian president Megawati Sukarnoputri has ended months of speculation by selecting the country’s most popular politician, Jakarta governor Joko Widodo, as her party’s candidate for July’s transformative presidential election

March 14, 2014 9:06 am

Widodo to contest Indonesian presidency

By Ben Bland in Jakarta

Former Indonesian president Megawati Sukarnoputri has ended months of speculation by selecting the country’s most popular politician, Jakarta governor Joko Widodo, as her party’s candidate for July’s transformative presidential election.

Mr Widodo, a political outsider until he was elected governor of the capital two years ago, has become wildly popular across the world’s third biggest democracy because of his down-to-earth manner, focus on delivery and pro-poor policies such as free healthcare and education.

On Friday afternoon, the enigmatic Ms Sukarnoputri finally selected Mr Widodo as the presidential candidate for her Democratic Party of Indonesia-Struggle in a handwritten directive that was read out by her daughter to cheers at a press conference.

“I have got a mandate from the chairwoman of PDI-P Megawati Sukarnoputri to become the presidential candidate for the party and, in the name of God, I am ready,” said Mr Widodo, dressed in a white shirt, red scarf and traditional black hat or peci, before symbolically kissing the national flag.

Southeast Asia’s biggest economy is facing a crucial political transition as President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono steps down this year after reaching the two-term limit, amid growing criticism of his indecisive leadership and increasingly protectionist economic policies.

Many Indonesians and international investors have bought into the hype that Jokowi, as he is universally known, is the man to fulfil Indonesia’s undoubted potential as the country struggles to improve its woeful infrastructure, rein in rising inequality and reform the bloated, graft-ridden bureaucracy.

In Indonesia’s complex electoral system, only political parties can nominate candidates for July’s presidential election and only if they reach a high threshold of 20 per cent of the seats or 25 per cent of the vote in the April 9 parliamentary election.

Mr Widodo has consistently polled way ahead of the other main contenders such as former special forces general Prabowo Subitanto and controversial businessman Aburizal Bakrie.

In recent weeks, Mr Widodo’s rivals have stepped up their attacks on him, highlighting a recent scandal involving the procurement of substandard public busses from China and his failure to make headway with a long-delayed monorail project.

“He has gone from god to human now and he has realised just how difficult it is to manage an enormous and deeply inefficient bureaucracy,” said one friend of Mr Widodo. “But this is a chance for Ms Sukarnoputri’s party, which has been out of power for a decade, to make a wave.”