Indonesia election watchdog summons Jokowi’s son Gibran for handing out free milk

The election watchdog (Bawaslu) chapter in Central Jakarta summoned Gibran for allegedly violating campaign rules by handing out free milk to people at a public “car-free day” event last month, the official said on Tuesday.

“We need to have clarification from Gibran, we want to make sure whether it [the allegation] is right or not,” Dimas Trianto Putro, an official at Bawaslu, told reporters.

A 2016 Jakarta gubernatorial regulation bars “events for the interests of political parties” at car-free day events, during which vehicles are banned from entering major thoroughfares.

Bawaslu does not have the authority to penalise Gibran, and it was not immediately clear if city authorities would mete out any punishment.

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Habiburokhman, a deputy head of Prabowo’s campaign team, said that Gibran will attend Bawaslu’s summons on Wednesday at around 1pm.

Another deputy at Prabowo’s campaign team, Afriansyah Noor, said the team would honour the agency’s ruling if the allegations are proven correct, adding they did not know the act was a violation.

While Prabowo is ahead of his opponents, there has been an uptick in popularity for Anies, with two polls in December by the Centre for Strategic and International Studies and Kompas newspaper showing he had overtaken Ganjar.