Indonesia’s president has a brand-new rival

A NIES BASWEDAN was ruining for a fight. Indonesia’s very first case of covid-19 had been confirmed on March second, and for weeks the guv of Jakarta, the capital, had been urging the main government to act. Yet the federal government dithered as the virus made inroads, initially through Jakarta, then throughout the nation. Lastly, on March 31 st, the president declared a nationwide emergency situation. Even then, regional authorities were told to ask authorization before setting up lockdowns– a process festooned in bureaucracy. Mr Anies trumpeted his reject. “[It’s] as if we are proposing a job that required an expediency research study,” he informed the Jakarta Post “Can’t the [health] ministry see that we are facing an increasing death toll? Is it insufficient?”

It was one shot in a salvo of recent attacks that Mr Anies (imagined) has released versus Joko Widodo, Indonesia’s president, much better referred to as Jokowi. He criticised Jokowi’s administration for not acting swiftly and robustly, and repeatedly challenged government information on the variety of covid-19 cases. It was “a slap in the face” for Jokowi and his lieutenants, a foreign diplomat says. The grievances clearly nettled the president. When Mr Anies tried to lock Jakarta down after Jokowi had invested weeks refusing to do the same to the whole country, Jokowi stated that the guv had no authority to do so. The following day he revealed the difficult treatments required before city governments could limit individuals’s motion.

Jokowi had actually not been hectored in that way for a while. In October he appointed as minister of defence Prabowo Subianto, his challenger during his two presidential campaigns. Since then Mr Prabowo has mainly toed the government line, leaving the post of primary enemy to the president uninhabited. Mr Anies appears to have decided to use up the task.

Relations between the 2 have not always been so stuffed. When Jokowi started his very first term as president in 2014, he selected Mr Anies minister of education and culture. However the latter’s extensive political aspiration curdled relations, states a previous consultant to Jokowi. The president dumped Mr Anies two years later in a cabinet reshuffle.

Mr Anies would get his own back in 2017, when he ran for guv of Jakarta versus a protégé of Jokowi, Basuki Tjahaja Purnama or Ahok, as he is better known. Ahok, who is Christian, had been leading in the surveys but was implicated of blasphemy after he pointed out the Koran in among his stump speeches. Mr Anies seized on the taking place outcry by allying with the Islamic Protectors Front ( FPI), a vigilante group that had been organising big protests versus Ahok. A wave of sectarian indignation carried Mr Anies to the guv’s mansion, in a humiliating setback for Jokowi.

However Mr Anies initially prevented straight criticising Jokowi, who stayed popular, says Alexander Arifianto of the S. Rajaratnam School of International Researches in Singapore. That altered this year, when downpours swamped Jakarta in January. Mr Anies tried to deflect criticism of his handling of the catastrophe by knocking the main government’s action. When covid-19 got here, Mr Anies turned the full blast of his ire against the president.

Edward Aspinall of Australian National University believes it likely that Mr Anies was genuinely concerned about the effect of covid-19 on his constituents. He also appreciates his image as “a public-policy individual who thinks seriously about major issues”, Mr Aspinall adds. His efforts to adopt a rigorous, data-driven reaction to the outbreak improve that image.

But Mr Anies also understands how to exploit Jokowi’s weak points. Many devout Muslims consider Jokowi too secular in his outlook and of dubious piety. They long for a champ to take on his government and take the presidency in 2024, when Jokowi completes his second and final term. Such voters underpinned Mr Prabowo’s 2 runs for president, and Mr Anies is already understood to a lot of them since of the Ahok affair. The governor of Jakarta is typically in the news, which will assist Mr Anies construct a nationwide profile. Jokowi himself utilized the task as a springboard to the presidency. And the most convenient way for Mr Anies to define himself remains in opposition to Jokowi.

Mr Anies has most likely determined that the pandemic offers an excellent chance to show off qualities numerous feel Jokowi does not have, such as decisiveness and empathy, states the foreign diplomat. The gambit may work. Many presidential prospects will not start their campaigns for another 2 years. Mr Anies is already courting opposition MP s. Nasdem, one of the celebrations in Jokowi’s coalition, is getting closer to Mr Anies, says the previous assistant to Jokowi. It’s a long road to election day. As Mr Arifianto states, “Anies is simply making a head start.” ■

This short article appeared in the Asia area of the print edition under the heading “Viral marketing”