Provincial elections test Jokowi’s popularity

Bloomberg

Indonesia’s most populous province is set to go the polls in what’s shaping up as a test of President Joko Widodo’s popularity and a potential springboard for his rivals ahead of next year’s presidential election.
More than 30 million people are expected to vote in West Java’s gubernatorial election on Wednesday in a contest between two former generals,
the sitting deputy governor and the provincial capital’s popular mayor.
They’re part of Indonesia’s 152 million voters who will elect dozens of heads of provinces, cities and districts across the archipelago.
While 171 elections will be held simultaneously, whoever wins in West Java will gain significant momentum going into the 2019 presidential race. Widodo, also known as Jokowi, had been lauded for an ambitious infrastructure agenda and reform programme that’s helped secure sovereign rating upgrades and much-needed
investment.
Yet his zeal for reform, already under a cloud after a series of populist measures in recent months, could be dialed back further if West Java was to fall into rival hands.
While Jokowi’s popularity has soared across the country, West Java was the scene of one of his heaviest defeats during the 2014 election to now
opposition leader Prabowo Subianto. Recent polls show the
Democrat Party, led by former president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, also making inroads.
Home to Indonesia’s biggest electorate, the province also has the country’s highest jobless rate, at 8.16 percent — well above the national average of 5.13 percent. That could complicate Jokowi’s efforts to point to his economic record as he bids for a second term.
The outcome in West Java is critical, said Jakarta-based Edward Gustely, managing director of investment advisory firm Penida Capital.
“How well the party candidates show and how they finish really is a momentum factor for the presidential election.”
Prabowo, whose Gerindra Party won a bitter election in Jakarta last year, remains a popular figure in West Java and is expected to challenge Widodo for the presidency in 2019.