Presidential Runoff in Indonesia Could Turn Into a Close Contest

A September contest to choose Indonesia’s next leader was shaping up Wednesday to be a tough fight between front-runner Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, a former security minister, and President Megawati Sukarnoputri, who appeared to have clinched the second spot in the runoff election.

With more than half the votes counted in Monday’s first round, Yudhoyono was leading with 34% and Megawati -- making a stronger showing than many expected -- was second with 26%. The top two finishers will go head-to-head in an election Sept. 20.

Although the aloof Megawati has often appeared ineffective in dealing with the country’s lawlessness and poverty, Monday’s vote shows that she still has a considerable base of support and can use the power of her office to sway the electorate.

Yudhoyono, a charismatic retired general who was so far ahead in the polls last month that some speculated that he might win a majority in the first round, seems to have lost considerable support in the closing days of the campaign.

“What it means for September is that it really is a horserace now,” said R. William Liddle, a professor of political science at Ohio State University and a leading expert on Indonesia, who was in Jakarta for the election.

None of the five presidential candidates in the first round has claimed victory or conceded defeat, but retired Gen. Wiranto was holding steady in third place with 22% and analysts said it was unlikely that he would be able to close the gap with Megawati. Like many Indonesians, Wiranto goes by one name.

Revised results of a survey of 2,500 selected polling stations released by the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs predicted that Yudhoyono, widely known as SBY, would finish with 33%, Megawati with 26% and Wiranto with 22%. The Washington-based group’s “quick count” polling methods, with a margin of error of 1 percentage point, have accurately predicted the outcomes of numerous elections around the world.

Election officials said they did not expect any legal challenge to arise from an election-day ruling that ballots accidentally double-punched by voters would be considered valid. The decision led to the counting of millions of ballots that initially had been ruled invalid, but officials said the move did not favor any one candidate or affect the outcome.

Assuming the final count confirms their victories, the challenge for Yudhoyono and Megawati in the runoff will be to woo voters who supported the other three candidates, particularly members of the former ruling Golkar Party, which backed Wiranto.

Former Atty. Gen. Marzuki Darusman, a Golkar vice chairman and Wiranto advisor, predicted that most Golkar voters would back Yudhoyono if their candidate was no longer in the race.

“There is a mood for change,” Darusman said. “There is a yearning for normalcy. SBY represents change and at the same time much more managerial competence. I think leadership is being demanded and the mood is for a much more orderly direction.”

But the power of incumbency is not to be underestimated.

Rizal Mallarangeng, an advisor to Megawati and executive director of the Freedom Institute, a Jakarta think tank, noted that the president had made a remarkable comeback in the first round. A month ago, she was trailing Yudhoyono by 30 percentage points in polls, he said.

“I think the strategy is to go back to the people and ask the people for their trust, to show she has weaknesses but also some success and let the people decide,” Mallarangeng said. “She has to be honest with the people, and she needs to show herself. There is a good side in her that the people don’t know.”

The balloting, which was notable for a lack of violence and for the enthusiasm of the voters, won the praise of election observers, including former President Carter.

At a news conference Wednesday in Jakarta, the capital, Carter said that since 1998, when former military ruler Suharto stepped down, Indonesia had made a remarkable transformation from an authoritarian state to a democracy.

“It is something of a political miracle to see a country with this degree of complexity make this transition in just six years,” he said.

Carter noted that the world’s three largest democracies are dominated by three different religions. India, the largest, is primarily Hindu; the United States is largely Christian; and Indonesia is mainly Muslim.

“I think this is a vivid demonstration that it’s not citizens’ religious faith that decides whether they prefer democracy,” he said. “I think this rejects a frequent statement that I hear in America that the Muslim faith is incompatible with democracy. The people of Indonesia have proven that to be a false premise.”