Armando Siahaan, Indonesia – The Democratic Party has experienced a resurgence in provincial elections that have traditionally been won by more established parties, but needs to do more at district and municipal levels, analysts said on Wednesday.
The party's candidates won three of seven gubernatorial elections held in 2010, all of them coming after Anas Urbaningrum was named the ruling party's new chairman in May.
"After Anas was elected, the Democrats' winning percentage in regional elections went up significantly," said political analyst Burhanuddin Muhtadi of the Indonesian Survey Institute (LSI).
Under Anas's leadership, Burhanuddin went on, the party had undergone considerable internal consolidations, aimed in part at performing well in regional elections, which are often won by candidates backed by Golkar or the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P).
Anas has reportedly set a target of backing candidates to win 50 percent of all regional elections this year, from mayor to district head to governor.
The party's most recent gubernatorial win comes from Tuesday's election in North Sulawesi, where Democrat-backed Sinyo Harry Sarundajang, the incumbent, is on course for victory, according to official estimates.
The party also backed the incumbent in the Bengkulu election, Agusrin Maryono Najamuddin, who went on to win the July 3 poll. In Jambi, meanwhile, the Democrats backed challenger Hasan Basri Agus, who won the June 19 election there.
Burhanuddin said the party's new tack was apparent in how it persuaded Sinyo to cross over from the PDI-P by offering him a seat on its advisory board.
At the district and municipal level, however, the party is not as well entrenched among voters as Golkar and the PDI-P, with the latter two accounting for four-fifths of all election wins at this level, the LSI says.
"The Democrats' victory in the 2009 legislative elections isn't reflected at the regional level," Burhanuddin said.
Another analyst said the party's recent gubernatorial wins were just a flash in the pan. "They don't necessarily mean that the Democrats' task of enhancing their political infrastructure and network is over," said Arya Fernandes, a political analyst from Charta Politika.
He said the party's 2009 victory at the national level was largely due to its association with President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who chairs its advisory board. The real gap between the party's popularity and that of Yudhoyono is very distinct, Arya went on, as reflected in the regional elections.
He pointed out that in East Java, the country's most populous province, the Democrats won just one out of 15 district elections held there this year.
However, both analysts said the party was moving in the right direction under Anas's leadership toward rectifying that deficit.
"The Democrats hadn't won a single gubernatorial election before Anas was elected chairman in May," Burhanuddin pointed out, adding that the party needed to win as many local elections as it could to shore up support ahead of the 2014 general elections.
Arya said that regional heads were public figures with high exposure and electability among regional voters, and thus were viewed as key assets by political parties. He added many were also fairly wealthy, which made them even more desirable for parties seeking greater funding.
For the Democrats in particular, Arya said, having the backing of such highly placed public figures was crucial because Yudhoyono would be out of the picture by 2014 after having served two terms as president.
Despite their efforts, the Democrats are likely to fall behind again in this respect to Golkar, Burhanuddin said, but could in four years surpass them if they could sustain the current rate of wins. As for the PDI-P, he went on, they were a waning force whose circle of influence had shrunk.