The Indonesian Presidential Election

 “The Indonesian Presidential Election”

The 2024 Indonesian Presidential General Election, also called the 2024 Presidential Election, is the fifth general election in Indonesia which aims to elect the President and Vice President of the Republic of Indonesia. The election was held to determine the positions of president and vice president for the 2024–2029 term. This election will take place simultaneously in all regions of Indonesia on Wednesday, February 14 2024. This election is a political contestation to elect a new president to replace Joko Widodo, who has retired from office after serving two terms as president and cannot run again based on the constitution. Since 2014, the presidential election has been dominated by two candidates, a presidential candidate and a vice presidential candidate. They are Prabowo Subianto–Hatta Rajasa who are supported by parties supporting the government of Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and Joko Widodo–Jusuf Kalla, the majority of whom are supported by the opposition.[6] Repeating the same victory, Jokowi, who was Prabowo's rival in 2014 and 2019, won the presidential election again by winning 55.5% of the vote.[7] However, this is different from the 2004 and 2009 Presidential Elections where more than two candidates participated. In 2004, the presidential election was attended by five candidates in the first round with various backgrounds, including military, civilian, ulama and former president and former vice president.[8] Meanwhile in 2009, three candidates participated in the presidential election, one of which was the incumbent Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.[9]

The President of Indonesia is elected directly by the people through general elections every five years. According to the constitution, as stated in Article 7 of the 1945 Constitution of the Republic of Indonesia, incumbent President Joko Widodo and former President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono cannot participate in political contestation in the presidential election in 2024. Therefore, Indonesia is holding general elections simultaneously to elect executive and legislative for the 2024–2029 term. The presidential election should be held before the country's leadership transition on October 20 2024.

The general election period for the President and Vice President is regulated in Article 6A and Article 22E of the 1945 Constitution of the Republic of Indonesia. The general election for the President and Vice President is carried out in two rounds if in the first round no candidate pair obtains more than 50% of the vote. at least 20% of the votes spread across more than half of the provinces in Indonesia. Until now, the two-round general election for President and Vice President has only occurred in the 2004 General Election for President and Vice President.

In contrast to the previous general election, Prabowo Subianto's image is known to be firm and expressive as a reflection of his previous profession as a soldier. In 2019, Prabowo became the opposition to the incumbent government led by Joko Widodo. In each campaign, he always criticized the policies launched by Jokowi.[58] Likewise, in his oration Prabowo showed his firm stance in positioning himself as part of the opposition to Jokowi.[59] After that, Prabowo appeared more cooperative and tended to side with Jokowi's government, considering him as Minister of Defense in the cabinet and making Jokowi's son and Mayor of Surakarta, Gibran, his deputy.[60] In 2024, they are carrying out a vision that is sustainable with Jokowi's ideas, including continuing planning for the Archipelago Capital as one of the national strategic projects. In his campaign, Prabowo often came up with programs to distribute food and milk to students.[61] Apart from that, the phenomenon of "gemoy" has become a new term for Prabowo's identity.

For the vice presidential candidate debate, the public speculated that the debate was canceled by the KPU, resulting in misunderstandings among the public.[88][89] Previously, a debate for the vice presidential candidate was held, where the debate participants were Ma'ruf Amin and Sandiaga Uno. However, the KPU denied that there would be no debate for vice presidential candidates, instead it would present pairs of candidates in the debate contest, but the participants would be between presidential candidates, between vice presidential candidates, and between pairs of candidates.[90][91] So, the debates participated in by the vice presidential candidates will still be held in the second and fourth debates. The second debate covers the economy and infrastructure development, especially the development of the Indonesian IKN.[92] Debate participants are candidate number 1, Muhaimin Iskandar; candidate number 2, Gibran Rakabuming Raka; candidate number 3, Mahfud MD.