Next Jokowi? Indonesia’s regional elections give glimpse of leaders of the future

Early results show a new crop of young leaders emerging, some of whom will be tipped to follow President Joko Widodo’s path to the national stage

The polls also showed political dynasties retain their grip on Indonesia’s ballot boxes, even if some high profile names look to have lost

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Aditya Halindra Faridzki. Photo: Instagram

Published: 11:00am, 16 Dec 2020Updated: 8:58pm, 16 Dec 2020

Aditya Halindra Faridzki’s Instagram posts used to get around 2,000 likes. While he was a local lawmaker in Tuban regency, Indonesia’s East Java, he remained relatively unknown on the national political stage.

All that changed on December 9, when the Southeast Asian nation held simultaneous regional elections to select local leaders in 270 localities.

Aditya, who looks set to be Tuban’s new district chief, became a star on social media when photographs of his good looks went viral on TikTok and Twitter. Now his Instagram posts get between 14,000 and 20,000 likes.

His profiles in local media tend to follow a similar narrative: he is young, single, and is set to be one of the youngest local leaders in Indonesia. Early “quick count” results suggest Aditya took 60 per cent of the vote in his area, well ahead of his two contenders.

Quick counts are a sampling of the results at ballot stations, where pollsters monitor open vote counts at a select number of polls. The results are usually accurate in Indonesia. Official tallies will be announced by the election body this month.

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