What can the Adil Makmur Coalition get?

The drawing of ballot numbers for the Presidential election has been carried out. The Prabowo Subianto – Sandiaga Uno pair received ballot number 2. Unlike the 2014 Presidential Election, the Just and Prosperous Indonesia Coalition, which is the name of the Prabowo-Sandiaga pair coalition, is not a fat coalition. This coalition consists of four parties, namely Gerindra, PKS, PAN, and Demokrat. The composition of the Prabowo-Sandiaga pair is also different from the Jokowi-Ma'ruf pair who come from different elements, the Prabowo-Sandiaga pair come from the same party. In the process, the Just and Prosperous Indonesia Coalition has faced political turbulence with the heated discussion of the Vice Presidential Candidate, the issue of the Democrat Party standing on two feet, and the fight for the Deputy Governor of DKI Jakarta seat which dragged Gerindra and PKS.

Given this condition, the discussion on Prabowo’s coat-tail effect becomes important to see which party actually benefits from carrying Prabowo. Or, the parties in the Just and Prosperous Indonesia Coalition do not really expect Prabowo’s coat-tail effect? Populi Center held the Populi Forum for the 2019 Election with the theme “What Does the Just and Prosperous Indonesia Coalition Get?” on Thursday, September 27, 2018.

In this edition, the Populi Forum presents speakers Luky Sandra Amalia (LIPI Political Observer) and Suhud Alynuddin (PKS Presidential Candidate Director) to discuss the specified theme. Luky Sandra, a LIPI P2P researcher, said that the coattail effect works if the Presidential election is more popular than the Legislative election. From a theoretical perspective, there are two approaches to the coattail effect, namely the conventional and diffuse approaches.

In the conventional approach, the party that benefits is the party that is the presidential and vice presidential candidate. In this approach, Gerindra is the party that benefits the most because both Prabowo and Sandiaga come from the Gerindra party. Unlike the conventional approach, the diffuse approach works in a multi-party presidential system such as that adopted by Indonesia, in this model the benefits are for the party that supports the presidential and vice presidential candidates and the coalition member parties. However, the distribution of the coattail effect is not evenly distributed in each coalition member party. For Luky Sandra, in this model, the benefits are for the party that successfully associates itself with the presidential and vice presidential candidates that are supported.

Luky Sandra, a researcher at P2P LIPI, said, “PKS is a party that has tried hard to build this strong association since the beginning.” Since the beginning, PKS has put forward a number of names to be Prabowo’s vice presidential candidate, such as Sohibul Iman, Salim Segaf Al Jufri, and Abdul Somad. The associative effort was carried out again in mid-August 2018, when it labeled Sandiaga Uno a post-Islamist santri, this label was then upgraded to Ulama in September 2018. Most recently, PKS emphasized Prabowo’s commitment to give the position of Deputy Governor of DKI Jakarta to PKS, when the seat is currently being contested by Gerindra. Unlike PKS, for Demokrat and PAN, these two parties actually seem hesitant to associate themselves with Prabowo. Luky Sandra, a researcher at P2P LIPI, said, “By not associating themselves strongly, (it will actually) save their party’s votes.” On the other hand, the serial number of the presidential and vice presidential candidate pairs is not significant because it will only facilitate the legislative election campaign issues.

Suhud Alynuddin, PKS Presidential Candidate Director, admitted that the effect of Prabowo-Sandiaga's coattails on his party's electability is relatively limited. This effect only applies to parties that have direct presidential and vice presidential candidates. Therefore, the party led by Sohibul Iman will rely on PKS's own political machine. Suhud Alynuddin, PKS Presidential Candidate Director, said, "In the next five months, we are not expecting much from the presidential candidacy, but from the political machine and issues that we have built." In this case, PKS is reflecting on the strategy of the last Simultaneous Regional Elections, especially in the West Java region. The party's political machine factor and the strength of the issues raised are seen by Suhud Alynuddin as factors that boosted the votes for the Sudrajat-Akhmad Syaikhu pair to second place. He admitted that for the upcoming presidential and legislative elections, PKS is still looking for the most appropriate format to increase the vote acquisition of political parties in order to get maximum votes.