Indonesia heading to the polls

JAKARTA: Nearly 193 million Indonesians are eligible to vote in presidential and legislative elections today.

President Joko Widodo, the first Indonesian president from outside the Jakarta elite, is competing against Prabowo Subianto, a former special forces general from the era of authoritarian rule under military dictator Suharto.

The election is a huge logistical exercise costing about 27.6 trillion rupiah ($NZ2.8 billion).

Indonesians are casting votes not only for president but about 20,500 other candidates standing for the Senate and legislatures at the national, provincial and district levels.

Election officials are providing more than 1.6 million bottles of halalcertified indelible ink for voters to dip a finger in after casting ballots at some 810,000 polling stations.

The Election Commission estimates more than 17 million people are involved in ensuring the elections run smoothly, including volunteers, guards and registered witnesses for every polling station. But postersized ballots have drawn criticism as a challenge for elderly voters. elections are the norm.

But despite being the world’s most populous Muslim nation, the thirdlargest democracy and a member of the Group of 20 major economies, Indonesia has a low profile on the world stage.

That is slowly changing, with the country recently becoming a nonpermanent member of the United Nations Security Council, announcing a bid to host the 2032 Olympics and analysts forecasting its economy to be among the world’s five largest by 2030.