Is Indonesia’s Jokowi eyeing a Xi Jinping-style third term, despite falling approval and a faltering economy?

President Joko Widodo has repeatedly voiced his opposition to extending his second term in office, but some Jakarta power brokers are considering the idea

The Indonesian president has seen his poll numbers slip as the country deals with a slumping economy due to the pandemic, and a burgeoning inflation crisis

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Indonesia’s President Joko Widodo speaks at a meeting during the UN Climate Change Conference (COP26) in Glasgow, Scotland in November 2021. Photo: Reuters

Published: 8:30am, 1 May 2022

As Joko Widodo began his second term as Indonesia’s president in 2019, the leader of the world’s third-largest democracy found himself having to quell whispers there was a plan in the works for him to rule beyond the two-term legal limit.

Jokowi, as he is widely known, responded directly – and firmly. “People who suggested that idea have three motives to do so, they wanted to slap my face, they wanted attention, or they wanted me to sink, that is all,” the president told reporters at that time.

Fast forward three years, and these same murmurs have resurfaced, sparking fierce social media debates and occupying plenty of space in newspaper columns.

This time around, however, Widodo has curiously responded to calls for him to amend the constitution and run for a third term with a little less intensity.

Indonesian President Joko Widodo gestures during an interview in North Kalimantan province, Indonesia in October 2021. Photo: Reuters

That change of tack has been the cause of speculation that the idea – as far-fetched as it may sound now – is actually being seriously considered by Jakarta’s power brokers.

Political observers told This Week in Asia that one increasingly prevalent impression was that the powerful Minister of Maritime and Investment Affairs Luhut Pandjaitan – often described as the ‘prime minister’ due to his influence – was behind the idea.