Coalitionism

You've got to feel sorry for Vice-president and Golkar chairman Jusuf Kalla. He's got a tough choice to make. It's looking like Golkar won't make the 20% of votes needed to be able to nominate their presidential candidate, i.e. Jusuf Kalla. So he has two options: try and form a coalition with one or more other parties, or crawl back to President SBY and ask if he can be VP again (not president, and he is 68). The thing is, the first option means he may end up with nothing, and the second means he will almost certainly get his old job back. So what's it to be, JK?

The other parties are also in a bit of a fix. Traditionally (well OK, in 2004) the thinking is that the president and vice-president should be a nationalist-Islam pairing. So where does Megawati's PDI-P look for a VP to keep Mega company? Golkar is nationalist, so are Gerindra and Hanura. The best bet for Golkar and the PDI-P would be the squeaky clean Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), but unless President SBY is a complete fool, he will team up with the PKS (and run on an anti-corruption ticket). Among the Islamist parties, there is the United Development Party (PPP), but it's in decline and is looking increasingly tired and, frankly, old hat. What about the National Awakening Party (now without Mega's enemy Gus Dur)? The combined PDIP and PKB vote might just be enough to make the 20% , but both are very Java-centric parties, and may not carry the non-Java vote. And the National Mandate Party (PAN) has such an elitist and over-critical image that any pairing with Golkar (the New Order party that PAN opposed during the reform euphoria of the late 90s) or the PDI-P would be such breathtaking opportunism that Indonesia's voters might well see right through them.

So where does that leave Gerindra and Hanura? Leaving aside the fact that Indonesians may not want a war criminal as president, both parties may find themselves out of friends, or fighting tooth and nail (party leaders Prabowo and Wiranto hate each other) to attract enough parties to cobble together a coalition.

Whatever happens, there will be lots of humbug, hypocrisy, legal challenges to the election result and squabbles over the few months until the presidential election. Watch this space.