We let our party leader discuss this matter with the president-elect
Jakarta (ANTARA) - As the runner-up of the 2019 Parliamentary Elections, the Golkar party does not want to rush in and demand ministerial posts in the upcoming cabinet of President-elect Joko Widodo (Jokowi), a senior official has hinted. Instead, the party's seniors will let the president-elect decide how he intends to proportionally accommodate Golkar's cadres in his cabinet, Chairperson of the Golkar Party's Central Executive Board Meutya Hafid said here Saturday.

Golkar leader Airlangga Hartarto was mandated to discuss this ministerial post issue with Jokowi, she told a radio station's talk show highlighting a controversy surrounding Jokowi's coalition parties' struggle for gaining ministerial posts.

"We let our party leader discuss this matter with the president-elect," Hafid said, adding that from the beginning, along with the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDIP) and several other coalition parties, Golkar has supported Jokowi's candidacy.

Therefore, the Golkar Party trusts the president-elect to provide proportional berths to his coalition parties in the cabinet, she said.

"Mr. Jokowi also does know his needs regarding his cabinet line-up for his second presidential term," she added.

Meanwhile, the National Awakening Party (PKB) politician, Daniel Johan said the PKB leader Muhaimin Iskandar has proposed 10 names of the party's cadres to Jokowi but he did not know those who had been nominated to sit in the president-elect's cabinet.

The names that Muhaimin Iskandar had proposed to Jokowi were different from those who might have been proposed by the Nahdlatul Ulama's (NU's) Central Executive Board despite the fact that the real supporters of both PKB and NU were relatively similar.

In response to this cabinet line-up issue, the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDIP) affirmed that it had no objection to the National Democratic Party's (Nasdem's) and PKB's demands for a certain number of ministerial posts.

"It is not a problem if the PKB and Nasdem have demanded a certain number of ministerial posts. That is OK. It is just a request," PDIP Deputy Secretary General Eriko Sotarduga said, adding that as a Jokowi-Amin pair's prime supporter, PDIP would support Jokowi's decision.

It would not intervene in the rights and sovereignty of the Joko Widodo-Ma'ruf Amin pair's coalition parties regarding the cabinet line-up issues, the PDIP revealed.

However, as the president-elect, it was Jokowis prerogative to select and determine figures who he picks in his cabinet, and all coalition parties could merely propose. The PDIP itself, would not beg for ministerial posts, he said.

"For the PDIP, Mr. Jokowi is its best cadre so we are supporting whatever decision he will have made. We also see him as a statesman who will also have the ethics of statesmanship," he said.

The issues related to ministerial posts would be deliberated by Jokowi and the PDIP leader, Megawati Soekarnoputeri. Therefore, the PDIP did not see the need to make any requests, he said.
Related news: No objection to Nasdem, PKB's demands, says PDIP
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(INE)

EDITED BY INE

Translator: Rahmad Nasution
Editor: Suharto
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