Unity of Support for Anies Amid Threats of Split
The Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) chose former Jakarta Governor Anies Baswedan as their preferred presidential candidate. The decision was conveyed by the Deputy Chairman of the PKS Shura Council Sohibul Iman in a press conference yesterday afternoon at Soekarno-Hatta Airport, Tangerang. He stated that the decision was made by the shura council, the highest decision-making body in the Islamic party.
"We want this important message to be widely known by the Indonesian people so that it provides clarity about PKS's political stance and no longer raises questions or speculations about the direction of PKS support in the 2024 election," said Sohibul who had just arrived from Turkey. He also said that the PKS would hand over the issue of the vice presidential candidate to Anies through an objective mechanism.
When delivering the decision, Sohibul was accompanied by the head of Anies' campaign team Sudirman Said, Secretary General of the Democratic Party Teuku Riefky, Democratic Party Spokesman Herzaky Mahendra Putra, and PKS spokesperson Pipin Sopian. There were no representatives from the NasDem Party at the press conference, even though the party had declared its support for Anies on Oct 3, 2022.
Sudirman Said stated that this affirmation of commitment by PKS showed that Anies was the first presidential candidate to receive sufficient vote support from political parties. The Election Law stipulates that presidential candidates can only be nominated by political parties or coalitions of parties that hold at least 20 percent of the total seats in the House of Representatives (DPR) or 25 percent of valid votes in the previous elections.