Teman Ahok: Another Independent Movement Not Yet Convincing

Welcoming 2016, DKI Jakarta Governor Basuki Tjahaja Purnama (Ahok) is expected to give better service for public. Ahok also expected that Jakartans will have “more loaded brains”, becoming cleverer, more religious and more prosperous.

So, what do you feel about Jakarta nowadays? Is it better than yesterday or just the same old stories? Since Ahok led this capital city on 19 November 2014substituting Jokowi, a lot of changes have happened in many aspects as he would continue the good and clean governance system (e-governance), for instance: the disclosure of corruption case in Jakarta Legislative Council (DPRD) on UPS system in several state senior high schools, the improvement of drainage system, assertive action on dismissal underperformed civil servants (PNS), etc.

Meanwhile, toward 2017 – year of Jakarta Governor Election (Pilkada), Ahok who had resigned from Gerindra in 2014, needs kind of basis to support him facing the upcoming Pilkada. As tit for tat, Teman Ahok (Ahok’s supporter movement) claimed its position to support in nominating incumbent DKI Jakarta Governor Ahok to the upcoming Pilkada through independent way.Based on temanahok.com, they have collected 555,033 KTP. Indeed, to become one of governor candidates, the independent candidate must collect several supports by submitting copies of KTP (at least 7.5% of total population, estimated around 750,000 KTP) and filling form provided by the General Elections Commission (KPU) as stipulated on the regulation PKPU No.9/2015 on the governor candidates. In addition, Teman Ahok also reported that they have collected Rp797,376,000 of campaign fund by their supporters per December 2015 despite there have been rumors circulating that say Teman Ahok is also funded by Bank Artha Graha International.

However, according to Indoprogress.com, Muhammad Ridha – one of the contributors – published an article about the illusion behind Ahok’s popularity. Ridha argued that the popularity, which comes up among public in line with Ahok’s bravery to reveal the Jakarta’s bureaucracy system which has been corrupted, distransparency and unaccountable, is just an illusion. Furthermore, Ridha suggested public to urge Ahok and his government to create particular regulations in form of public politic contribution improvement to hinder the upcoming regulations which will be ruled by certain elites or parties.This statement needs to be considered by Teman Ahok which is also being participated by many non-Jakartans in order to prevent any fanatic supporting actions ignoring other experts’ opinion.

Besides, Teman Ahok needs also to consider the way Ahok played in Indonesian politic ambience. Populi Center head Nico Harjanto said Teman Ahok needs to consider any possibilities that would be taken by Ahok whether to run as an independent or to start negotiating with political parties. Moreover, Nico added that Ahok’s problem is not how to gain support, but how to compete with candidates from the political parties.

So, will Teman Ahok survive to accompany Ahok until the election? And, will Ahok remain independent without any support by existing political parties until the election? I think that Teman Ahok should reflect its movement with previous independent candidate Faisal Basri-Biem Benjamin #BerdayaBareng2 which had collected 597,719 copies of KTP and Rp15 billions of campaign funds during 2012’s Pilkada.