Indonesia’s Prabowo Subianto most qualified to become president, brother Hashim Djojohadikusumo says

Indonesian tycoon Hashim Djojohadikusumo is his politician brother Prabowo Subianto’s most loyal supporter – and he is not ashamed to make that known to the world.

As the nomination period for the country’s February presidential poll nears, Prabowo, Indonesia’s defence minister and a former commander of its special forces, is dominating surveys that put him as a front runner to succeed the nation’s incumbent leader Joko Widodo.

In a likely three-way race involving Prabowo, former Central Java governor Ganjar Pranowo, 54, and Anies Baswedan, 54, the former Jakarta governor currently aligned with the opposition, whoever gets the nod of approval from the highly popular Widodo is seen as very likely to be the winner.

In an interview this week, Hashim underscored his view that his brother, 71, was the most qualified of the trio to lead Southeast Asia’s sole G20 economy, given his extensive experience and network of connections.

“He is the only [one] of the three big contenders who has the international experience, the military experience and the diplomatic experience. The other two do not,” Hashim said in the interview on the sidelines of Monday’s Hong Kong-Asean Summit.

Asked to describe his famously pugnacious brother in three words, Hashim replied after some thought: “Visionary, honest, less temperamental”.

The brothers are scions of one of Indonesia’s major political families and younger sibling Hashim, 69, with an estimated net worth of well over US$600 million, has long been known for financing the Gerindra Party that they co-founded.

Their father Sumitro was one of the late strongman Suharto’s key economic tsars and their grandfather was the founder of Bank Negara Indonesia, one of the nation’s biggest banks.

“I don’t speak for my brother [but] my personal sense is that the president is leaning towards my brother,” Hashim said.

Indonesia’s Prabowo to ensure ‘continuity’ if he becomes president, brother says

Asked to elaborate on why he believed Widodo would back Prabowo, Hashim pointed to “anecdotal evidence” and recent signals sent out by the Widodo camp.

Widodo’s eldest son Gibran Rakabuming Raka is the mayor of Surakarta in Solo, where Widodo first launched his political career. Gibran for months has been touted as a potential running mate for Prabowo and has been seen with the former general with increasing frequency.

Projo, Widodo’s vast personal volunteer network, has also signalled it backed Gibran to be the next vice-president.

Whether Prabowo picks him will be determined by a court ruling on Monday on a petition seeking to lower the age limit of presidential and vice-presidential candidates to 35 from 40. Gibran is 36.

Hashim, an ebullient orator like his brother, said “90 per cent of Jokowi’s volunteer supporters have declared for Prabowo”, using the president’s nickname.

The businessman also highlighted that a group of Muslim clerics who have backed Widodo over the last decade recently threw their support behind Prabowo, after a meeting with the president.

In the interview, Hashim dismissed suggestions that his brother’s chequered past – especially during his time in the military – would hurt him at the polls.

The defence minister is on his fourth bid for high political office, having lost in 2009 as a vice-presidential candidate, and in 2014 and 2019 when he was the main rival to Widodo.

While his machismo persona has helped him command a huge following, Prabowo has long faced unproven accusations over his involvement in the kidnapping of activists in the months before Suharto was toppled in 1998.

Indonesia’s Prabowo casts himself as ‘Jokowi’s man’ in third bid for presidency

Prabowo was discharged from military service following the fall of Suharto for overstepping orders, but has always denied wrongdoing and direct involvement in torture or mass killings.

Asked about questions in the West concerning his brother’s human rights record, Hashim said: “Indonesians vote for the president.”

Pressed on whether citizens had “forgiven and forgotten” Prabowo’s past, Hashim said “many have forgiven … many have not forgotten, but you know, you can still move on”.

He raised the example of the 1990s democracy activist Budiman Sudjatmiko, who in August threw his support behind Prabowo.

“When I said continuity, that is one of the programmes that we will continue,” Hashim said. When completed, Nusantara would serve as administrative capital in the mould of the United States’ Washington or India’s New Delhi.

“At the moment, Jakarta is Washington, New York, Los Angeles all rolled into one,” he said.

On the foreign-policy front, Prabowo was likely to stay the course on Indonesia’s decades-old neutrality policy, Hashim said.

“We are friends with everybody, we will not be dragged into conflict,” Hashim said, comparing Indonesia to the likes of Switzerland and Sweden, which are not formally part of Western military alliances.

The Hong Kong-Asean Summit 2023 was jointly organised by the South China Morning Post, the Hong Kong-Asean Foundation and the Our Hong Kong Foundation.