Indonesian politics are becoming less predictable

WITH an eager smile and only a few tufts of hair on his chin, Ibrahim, a 30-year-old protester in Jakarta, does not seem like much of a Muslim firebrand. Yet on September 29th he and his four-year-old son, Alid, who clutched a flag emblazoned with the opening lines of the Koran, joined thousands of hard-line Islamists marching in protest against the government. Their concern? Communism and the “criminalisation” of Islam in the world’s most populous Muslim country, he says. In a feat of doublethink, he rails against capitalism, too: “There’s no distribution of wealth, so the rich become richer and the poor become poorer.” Ibrahim may have a fuzzy idea of what exactly he is protesting against. But his muddled ideology could still present a threat to President Joko Widodo, commonly known as Jokowi, who is likely to seek a second five-year term in 2019.

Jokowi’s election in 2014 was hailed by enthusiastic observers as a turning-point in Indonesian politics. When campaigning he...Continue reading

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