Jokowi has chosen Ma’ruf Amin as his vice president candidate, why do you think Jokowi

decided to choose Ma’ruf Amin instead of other candidates?

Jokowi has decided to team up with Ma’ruf Amin in the upcoming presidential election in 2019.
This surprising move brings many interpretation, since there are other stronger candidates such as,
Mahfud MD or Tuan Guru Bajang. Many people believe that there are some possible reasons
underlining the decision. The following paragraphs will discuss some of them.
The first thing that come to my mind is that Jokowi does not want to take a risk by selecting figure
who is not part of a religious organization. Jokowi has learnt that religion issue is one of the
strongest weapon to defeat someone, because in Indonesia religion is valued highly. If he failed to
get support from a strong religious organization, he would get very hard time to deal with religion
issue. He also learned from the previous presidential election, in 2014, where he was mercilessly
attacked by his rival. For example, He was accused as being a son of communist and he was also
accused as a communist himself. Moreover, Jokowi is also well aware that his former partner,
Basuki Tjahaya Purnama (Ahok), was brought down by the very same issue. In order to avoid the
worst case scenario, Jokowi take preventive step by choosing Ma’ruf Amin who is known as the
leader of MUI (Indonesian Ulema Council). More than that, Ma’ruf Amin has NU, the biggest
Muslims organization, behind his back. By doing this, Jokowi seems really sure that his rival in
presidential election will highly unlikely use religion issue. Mahfud MD or Tuan Guru Bajang may
be well known as decent candidates but they lack of support from particular Islamic organization
which Jokowi need the most. The second reason is Jokowi and his parties’ allies want to save their
chance in the next presidential election in 2024. By choosing Ma’ruf Amin, they can have greater
chance to have president candidate from their own parties, because it is logical to think that if they
choose strong candidates such as Mahfud MD or Tuan Guru Bajang, it will be very possible that
they will compete in 2024 election as president candidate, and both of them do not have any tie
with any parties. This possibility can be reduced to almost nonexistent if Jokowi choose Ma’ruf
Amin, since Ma’ruf Amin will be almost impossible to compete in the 2024 election as he will be
too old by 2024.
On the other side, there are also people who believe that the decision is only for the sake of
goodness. They believe that by choosing person from Islamic organization many positive effects
will come. Firstly, Indonesia is the biggest Muslim country, so, choosing Ma’ruf Amin will
strengthen the bond between Muslims and also bond between Muslims. This is also great issue
since in the recent years there were alarming tensions between Muslims in Indonesia. Secondly,
the Islamic hardliner organization, such as FPI (Islamic Front Defender) and alike, will be more
supportive to the government, because they have representative from the Ulema side, something
that they have demanded on Jokowi’s rival.
All in all, Jokowi has made his final decision, and it definitely will not appease all of the people.
For good or bad, the decision will bring consequences for him. Based on my observation in several
social medias, mainly Twitter, the most notable one is he will certainly loose support from Ahok’s
supporter, because Ma’ruf Amin is the one who testified against Ahok in his trial on blasphemy
case. Actually Ahok’s supporters are also Jokowi’s supporters, but the decision has left those
people in doubt. Most of them begin to think to abstain in the upcoming election or they prefer
choose prabowo, Jokowi’s rival. The track record of Ma’ruf Amin as an intolerant person also
exacerbate the unfavorable opinion about him. He released several controversial fatwas in the past
which severely damaging minority rights. The fatwas said that Ahmadi Muslim is haram and the
same fatwa is also released for Shi’ite Muslims, and there are also fatwas about LGBT, joining
BPJS, and congratulating our Christian friends during Christmas. The number of people
questioning Jokowi’s choice cannot be underestimated. There are millions of them. This may or
may not jeopardize Jokowi’s chance to win the presidential election, but, if he does not take
necessary action such as showing more attention towards minority, he will keep losing more voter
and in the end he may lose his position as president.