Ezra Sihite – The famously outspoken Taufik Kiemas is again butting heads with his wife, Megawati Sukarnoputri, telling the former president that it is time to put away her presidential ambitions and let someone younger run in 2014.
Taufik said his wife, chairwoman of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), was too old to run despite several recent surveys pointing to her as the front-runner for 2014.
"I think it's time we let the country's young people run in 2014," Taufik, the speaker of the People's Consultative Assembly and chairman of the PDI-P's board of patrons, said on Tuesday.
It's not the first time he has delivered the kind of message most husbands would be afraid to give their wives. He said much the same thing last October, urging Megawati to make way for new blood.
He also said on Tuesday that if the party failed to garner at least 20 percent of the total vote in the legislative elections it could forget nominating its own presidential candidate. "All parties need to go through regeneration and nurture younger leaders. I think it's time for Bu Mega to do this," he said.
On the back of her strong showing in the recent surveys, Megawati has given the strongest hints yet that she may run in 2014. "We need regeneration, but it has to be about pushing forward the best members," she said recently. "Don't make it a power grab."
Megawati, 65, who ran unsuccessfully for president in 2004 and 2009, said age should not be an issue. "For me, there's no such thing as old or young. You can have a 20-year-old who, because of drugs, is unhealthy and no longer thinks clearly," she said. "Conversely, you can have an older person who, because of better life choices, has plenty of energy and does well. It's all relative."
A survey by Saiful Mujani Research and Consulting last week put Megawati as the front-runner for 2014. She received a positive response from 93.7 percent of the survey's 1,219 respondents.
She was followed by former Vice President Jusuf Kalla, with 88.9 percent. Prabowo Subianto, the former general and leader of the Great Indonesia Movement Party (Gerindra), was third with 78.8 percent, followed by another former general, Wiranto, with 72.8 percent. Wiranto is chairman of the People's Conscience Party (Hanura).
PDI-P youth wing chairman Maruarar Sirait said that although the party had not yet made a decision on its presidential candidate, the youth wing wanted Megawati to run.
It's not a sentiment shared by some analysts. "She will run if she has no shame, because she has been defeated twice in the last two elections," said Fachry Ali, a political expert from the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI).