Parties join forces to attack Jokowi

JAKARTA. Major political parties have jointly attacked Jakarta Governor Joko “Jokowi” Widodo for conducting another of his trademark unannounced visits — known locally as blusukan — a move which many said would damage Jokowi’s chances in the 2014 presidential election.

The political parties used the report from the Indonesian Forum for Budget Transparency (Fitra) that found the visits were a waste of government money, as the basis for their attack.

According to the antigraft watchdog, the Jakarta administration has doubled spending for Jokowi’s impromptu visits for 2013 to Rp 26.6 billion (US$2.6 million), which according to Fitra, resulted in nothing but the soaring popularity
of Jokowi.

Jokowi has criticized Fitra by saying the report was baseless, his deputy Basuki “Ahok” Tjahaja Purnama said the publication was politically-motivated.

“I don’t understand what Fitra is trying to achieve with this report. It seems there are political parties that feel threatened by Pak Jokowi’s popular impromptu visits, which apparently are very difficult to imitate for some,” Ahok told reporters at City Hall.

Ahok’s statement quickly raised the ire of political parties’ officials.

“I don’t understand why Ahok politicized the matter because Fitra was specifically referring to the budgeting issue, not politics. He shouldn’t have tied the issue with his [Jokowi’s] electability,” Democratic Party (PD) deputy chairman Max Sopacua told reporters.

Max added Ahok had unfairly targeted Fitra with his statement.

“Is he saying that Fitra is somehow linked to the Democratic Party, for example?” he said.

Leader of the PD faction at the House of Representatives, Nurhayati Ali Assegaf, said Jokowi could not claim the unannounced visits were not solely his own creation.

Nurhayati said the practice had been conducted by many politicians before, including PD chairman and President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.

“Pak SBY as well as many other officials, such as East Java Governor Soekarwo [a PD politician], conducted such visits long before Jokowi did. We just didn’t talk about it so much. It’s wrong to say Jokowi first came up with the move, which was later copied by the country’s officials,” Nurhayati said.

The secretary of the Golkar Party’s faction, Ade Komarudin, also joined the fray, saying that Golkar leaders also practiced the tradition long before Jokowi, starting with former president Soeharto.

Ade added Golkar party chairman Aburizal “Ical” Bakrie had also carried on the tradition.

“There is no need to compare which one is better than the others. The most important thing is that the style is good and we need to support it,” he said.

Earlier this year, Yudhoyono made a departure from his usual style by making an impromptu visit to a poor neighborhood near Jakarta, a move which many said was only a ploy to shore up support for his embattled PD.

Analysts said with the general election a year away, it was never too late for Yudhoyono to make a change in his leadership style, including by making such visits more often.

Many also said Yudhoyono’s decision to make such visits indicated he was disappointed with the performance of some of his ministers. (Margareth S. Aritonang)