Indonesia’s presidential election has high stakes for US and China
JAKARTA, Indonesia—when Indonesians cast their votes on Wednesday for a new president in one of the world’s biggest elections, the stakes will also be high for the United States and China.
The Southeast Asian nation is a key battleground economically and politically in a region where the rival global powers have long been on a collision course over Taiwan, human rights, US military deployments and Beijing’s aggressive actions in disputed waters, including the South China Sea.
Outgoing President Joko Widodo’s foreign policy avoids criticism of Beijing and Washington but also rejects alignment with either power. The delicate balancing act has won considerable Chinese trade and investment for Indonesia, including a $7.3 billion high-speed railway that was largely funded by China, while Jakarta has also boosted defense ties and intensified military exercises with the US.
These policies would likely continue if election frontrunner Prabowo Subianto, the current defense minister whose vice presidential running mate is Widodo’s eldest son, wins, according to analysts.
“None of the major structural features of defense and foreign policy, I think, will change,” said Evan Laksmana, a Southeast Asia security expert at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in Singapore.
Subianto adheres to a policy of neutrality and has publicly praised the US and China. He cited America’s historical role in pressuring the Netherlands to recognize Indonesian sovereignty in the 1940s, during a forum in November at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank in Jakarta.
“This is part of history and we cannot forget this debt of honor,” said Subianto, who also extolled China’s importance to Southeast Asia. “China is a great civilization. It has contributed a lot and now it is very, very active and contributing a lot to our economy.”
Former Education Minister and Jakarta Governor Anies Baswedan, a presidential candidate who is trailing Subianto in most independent surveys, said he would shift what he called Widodo’s “transactional” foreign policy to one anchored on principles if he triumphs in the elections.
“When a country invades another country, we can say this is against our basic values. Even though we are friends, if rights were violated, we can reprimand them,”baswedan toldthe Associated Press in an interview last month without saying which country he was alluding to.
Baswedan said human rights and environmental protection should underpin Indonesia’s foreign policy. “If we have no values, then there is a cost-benefit relationship, where we will only support countries that are profitable for us,” he said.