Adianto P. Simamora, Jakarta – As elections draw closer, political party leaders have intensified communications between them, but avoided early talks of possible coalitions.
Chairman of the United Development Party (PPP) Suryadharma Ali held a rare meeting with Vice President Jusuf Kalla, who chairs the Golkar Party.
"As both Suryadharma and Kalla are party leaders, they also discussed about politics, including the possibility of a coalition," Lukman Hakim Saifuddin, who heads the party's faction at the House of Representatives, told The Jakarta Post on Wednesday.
Lukman said a coalition with Golkar was quite likely as both parties envision to promote a similar vision to build the country.
"The coalition is widely discussed. Pak Kalla says there is no different between the yellow and green," he said, referring to the colors of the two parties.
However Suryadharma and Kalla are committed to waiting for the results of legislative elections, on April 9, before any coalition decisions.
During the meeting, Suryadharma invited Kalla to attend the party's 36th anniversary, on Jan. 24 Asked whether the PPP had invited Kalla to take part in the PPP listens program, Lukman said "no".
"The program is dedicated only to presidential hopefuls. We have yet to hear any statement from Kalla about his presidential bid," said Suryadharma, who is the minister of cooperatives and small and medium enterprises.
The PPP has invited popular figures, including Yogayakarta sultan Hamengkubuwono X, chairman of the People's Conscience Party (Hanura), Wiranto and chairman of the Greater Indonesia Movement Party (Gerindra) Prabowo Subianto.
The party is also set to invite President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to the 'PPP listens' program. Yudhoyono has declared his plan to seek reelection and compete again for the presidency and has hinted at Kalla as his running mate.
Suryadharma criticized some presidential candidates contesting the elections as only searching for popularity. "Many presidential candidates fail to gauge their prospects," he said "They cannot estimate their capacity either."
Indonesia will hold the presidential election in July. The results of the legislative elections, to be held in April 9, would be used to determine the eligibility of parties to meet the threshold to promote their own presidential and vice presidential candidates.
The 2008 presidential law says only a party or coalition of parties securing 20 percent of seats at the House of Representative or 25 percent of the popular votes in the general election will be eligible to promote their own candidate.
Golkar finished first in the 2004 legislative elections with 20.6 percent of the vote, while the PPP came fourth out of the major parties.
The two parties, and the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), are the parties that survived the New Order era, when democratic elections were absent.
The PDI-P said its national meeting in Surakarta, Central Java next week would select the candidates for Megawati's running mate. "One of the agenda items is to discuss the vice presidential candidate. Hopefully, we can name the candidate," Ganjar Pranowo, legislator from the PDI-P said.
Hamengkubuwono and Sutiyoso, who have both declared their bids for the presidency, have been widely touted as strong candidates to be Megawati's running mate.
Sutiyoso, however, expressed pessimism that the PDI-P would be in a position to announce the vice presidential candidate at this time. "We can only see the political map after the legislative elections," Sutiyoso, who is a former Jakarta governor, said.
A number of surveys have concluded that Megawati and the incumbent, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, will probably square off in the presidential election.