Ganug Nugroho Adi, Boyolali – The Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle's (PDI-P) Central Java office has instructed members to remove posters depicting President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo as a Javanese king that have popped up around the provincial capital of Semarang.
"We have deployed hundreds of members to remove the posters. The PDI-P Central Java office instructed us to do so. We didn't put up the posters," PDI-P Boyolali secretary Sarno said on Tuesday.
The party found roughly 100 posters in 16 districts, tribunnews.com reported.
The posters show Jokowi wearing traditional Javanese clothing and Javanese-style crown, the PDI-P logo and the words "Let's work for the people." Supriyadi said most of the posters had been nailed to trees, while some were posted on the back of public minibuses.
"Many of the drivers said they had agreed to having a poster [on their buses] because it had a picture of Jokowi on it. They were given Rp 100 per vehicle," he said. "Until now, we do not know where the posters came from and who put them up everywhere."
PDI-P Central Java head Bambang Muryanto said the posters demeaned Jokowi by making him seem like a monarch, which was at odds with a democratic country.
"In a democracy there are no kings, there are elections," he said. "[The posters] demean Pak Jokowi."
He added that he suspected the posters were put up by Jokowi's political opponents as neither the regional or national campaign teams had produced them.
Central Java is considered a PDI-P stronghold, with Jokowi winning 66.6 percent of the vote in the province in the 2014 presidential election.
The posters appeared not long after presidential challenger Prabowo Subianto made a quip about "Boyolali faces" that was pounced on by the Jokowi team.
Prabowo's campaign team has denied any involvement in producing and installing the posters. "It's funny how everything is blamed on us," Gerindra Party and Prabowo campaign spokesman Andre Rosiade told reporters on Monday. (kmt/swd)