Jakarta. The Golkar Party will likely establish a new coalition to pave the way for chairman Airlangga Hartarto to run for the 2024 presidential election, an executive said on Wednesday. 

The move to build a new coalition was recommended during a recent meeting of senior party members grouping in Golkar’s board of experts, who doubled down on making Airlangga presidential candidate.

The board also recommended that Airlangga officially declares himself as a candidate before the end of August.

With 14.78 percent of House of Representatives seats, Golkar needs to team up with one more party to put Airlangga on the ballot next year. The election law requires a party or a coalition of parties to have at least 20 percent of House seats to nominate their candidate.

"We are very likely to do that [establish a new alliance] because Golkar as a runner-up in the last election can potentially form a new axis," said Ace Hasan Syadzily, chairman of Golkar’s West Java chapter.

The party also stays firm in nominating Airlangga for president as mandated by the 2019 national congress, he said.

Dave Laksono, another Golkar executive, said the decision to nominate Airlangga is final and binding unless the chairman himself turns down the mandate.

“There will be no such thing as extra-ordinary congress to alter the decision,” Dave said, responding to reports that the party might consider holding a congress to change the previous decisions after the existing coalition came to a premature end.

Golkar previously teamed up with the United Development Party (PPP) and the National Mandate Party (PAN) for the presidential election. The three-party alliance suddenly collapsed after the PPP jumped ship to nominate Ganjar Pranowo for president together with the ruling Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P).

Furthermore, PAN Chairman Zulkifli Hasan has publicly said the party will support any presidential candidate who takes State-Owned Enterprise Minister Erick Thohir as the running mate.

The uncertainties facing Golkar with only seven months left until the presidential election have triggered critical voices from some impatient members, including Ridwan Hisjam who joined Sunday’s meeting of the board of experts.

Ridwan said the party has not taken concrete actions since Airlangga was named a candidate in 2019. PPP’s departure from the three-party coalition also jeopardizes Airlangga’s 2024 bid because Golkar now badly needs the PAN to stay to meet the threshold.

If Airlangga secures the nomination, the upcoming presidential election may see four contenders who also include Ganjar, former Jakarta governor Anies Baswedan, and Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto.