| Home > South-East Asia >> Indonesia | |
Battle for Jakarta: Ahok under siege despite high approval rating in office
Sydney Morning Herald - February 10, 2017
They might be unsuited to Indonesia's sticky climate – many are long-sleeved and flannel – but that is not dampening enthusiasm or sales.
This is coveted Ahok merchandise. Shirts like these are worn by the polarising governor of Jakarta, Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, universally known by his nickname Ahok, and his army of loyal supporters.
The iconic plaid shirts were first worn during the 2012 gubernatorial election campaign by Ahok and his then running mate Joko Widodo, who is now the president of Indonesia. They symbolise everything Ahok stands for: hard work and no bullshit.
Ahok, the city's first openly ethnically Chinese and Christian governor, is standing for re-election on February 15. This time he is seeking a mandate of his own after he assumed the governor's chair when Jokowi became president in 2014.
But the campaign has been complicated by the fact that Ahok is fighting not just to save his political skin but also to stay out of jail, after he was named as a suspect for allegedly insulting Islam.
Many see the outcome of the election and blasphemy trial as a test of religious and racial tolerance in Indonesia, a Muslim-majority country with a population of more than 250 million that officially recognises six religions.
"I think this is going to be a litmus test of Indonesian Islam," says Tobias Basuki from the Centre for Strategic and International Studies. "Are we tolerant? I think this will be one of the most important elections, even more so in some ways than the last presidential election."
A shiny black car glides to the curb and Mariana Rahayu, an immaculately-groomed director of sales at a five-star hotel, jumps out to buy a plaid shirt.
"I'm a true Ahoker – I see Ahok not from a religious or racial perspective but from the perspective of what he has done," she tells us.
Mariana believes Ahok has succeeded where three former governors failed in addressing the city's chronic flooding problems caused by housing settlements on the river banks. "The evidence is quite complete – he is doing a good job."
Ahok has won plaudits for combating corruption, streamlining services, fast-tracking a Mass Rapid Transit rail system and reforming the creaky bureaucracy.
He insisted City Hall was there to serve the people. A smartphone app, Qlue, was launched, allowing Jakartans to report the problems that beset the heaving megalopolis: broken street lights, clogged drains, traffic jams, floods.
He evicted slum dwellers and relocated them to low-cost apartments in order to tackle flooding, create new parks and eliminate vice. This alienated many of the urban poor but it won praise from the middle class. His manner was abrasive, truculent – even arrogant – but he cleaned up the city.
"What distinguishes him from others are the large scope of his success stories, and the speed with which he achieves them," says Professor Ariel Heryanto from Monash University. "He demonstrated transparency and accountability in his work like no other public officers of his level."
Heryanto also points to the crass, impatient, abusive way in which Ahok deals with what he considers bad elements within the bureaucracy. "All this is so rare or idiosyncratic in Indonesia. Lee Kuan Yew's style of managing Singapore in the 1970s may be comparable to Ahok today."
But there is a yawning gap between the high level of public approval for Ahok's performance in office and the likelihood of his re-election.
A survey by polling group Indikator of more than 800 people in mid-January showed 75 per cent were satisfied with Ahok but his ticket's electability was just 38.2 per cent.
Ahok is pitted against two Muslim candidates: Agus Harimurti Yudhoyono, the son of former president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, and Anies Baswedan, a former university rector and education minister.
At first Ahok appeared a shoo-in. Agus, an infantry major in the army whose nomination took everyone by surprise, was young and inexperienced. Anies, who had recently been sacked from Jokowi's cabinet, also seemed an unlikely winner.
But Islamic hardliners had long maintained that a non-Muslim should not hold office. They seized their opportunity last September after Ahok provocatively told fishermen in the Thousand Islands that his opponents were using the Koran to deceive them into not voting for him.
Ahok's nemesis, a firebrand cleric named Rizieq Shihab, was the public face of colossal rallies calling for Ahok to be jailed. Eventually police caved in, after the sheer size of the rallies threatened to destabilise Indonesia, and named Ahok as a suspect.
To complicate matters further, Rizieq has also been named as a suspect for allegedly insulting Pancasila, the state ideology, and is being investigated by police over pornography.
Ahok has juggled court appearances every Tuesday with campaigning on his track record. His opponents, Anies and Agus, have homed in on the plight of those alienated by Ahok. Both have vowed to end evictions. Agus has promised direct cash payments to the poor.
But Australian National University academic Ross Tapsell wonders if the election will be decided on emotions rather than policies. His research examines the impact of a "post-truth" world, where voters have lost faith in the mainstream media and all news is considered equally fake.
An anti-Ahok cyber army is also hard at work. A popular meme calls Ahok a kafir [the Islamic term for an infidel]. Others link the ethnically Chinese governor to communism, which is banned in Indonesia.
"Online, this anti-Chinese sentiment has been really strong, which also helps to explain Ahok's decline in the polls," Tapsell says. "In addition we are also seeing a rise of pro-Islamic news sites, that in some cases try to replicate a credible news site... so a lot of anti-Ahok material is spread."
Monash University's Heryanto says it is unfortunate that many of the attacks against Ahok use racist rhetoric or exclusionary religious overtones.
"Ahok needs to be strongly criticised for his allegedly illegal practices in evicting some poor neighbourhoods when a lawsuit was still unresolved in court," he says. "But his strongest enemies have preferred to attack him on religious grounds and ignore the fate of the evicted families."
Polls are notoriously unreliable in Indonesia but it appears the three-legged race is close. Ahok and Anies are leading in most surveys but neither are likely to gain the majority needed to win the election outright on February 15.
This would mean the two top candidates would face off again in April. Ahok's opponent is expected to pick up the anti-Ahok vote, making it improbable that the incumbent governor would win.
"If it goes to the second round it will be very ugly with race and religion," warns Basuki. "This first round is not that brutal yet, because there are three candidates and Agus and Anies are fighting each other to make sure they're second. But if it goes to the second round, then it's going to get very, very, very ugly."
The other unknown is the outcome of Ahok's blasphemy trial. The Home Affairs Minister has said Ahok will only be suspended from office if prosecutors seek a jail sentence of more than five years. Otherwise, Ahok could potentially still be governor even if convicted of blasphemy.
"He will appeal, and while he's on appeal, he's not in prison," Basuki says. "And while it is a process of appeal he's still governor from my understanding."
Mariana will be overseas on February 15 but intends to post a photo of herself on social media. She will be wearing her new plaid shirt in solidarity.
She poses, grinning broadly, and gives Ahok's trademark two-finger salute (his ticket will be listed second on the ballot paper). "I cannot (be here for the) election, but my heart will vote for him."
See also:
 |