After giving his ex-wife a memorable hug at the conference’s opening on Sunday, Prabowo Subianto is now making headlines for giving Aburizal Bakrie a more figurative hug of approval.
Prabowo, chairman of the Gerindra Party (and President Joko Widodo’s opponent in the Indonesian presidential election), reportedly congratulated incumbent Bakrie today on his reelection as chairman of Golkar at the political party’s national congress in Bali.
While congratulating Bakrie over getting the chairmanship, Prabowo stressed the importance of a strong Golkar for the opposition Red-White coalition (the KMP), which he himself established. As the largest of five-parties in the KMP coalition, a strong Golkar is a strong KMP, he underscored.
“Looking ahead, our nation faces critical challenges,” Prabowo said at the closing ceremony of the Bali congress, as quoted by the Jakarta Globe. “We’re facing a crossroads — can we rise, compete, or merely become a market for other people’s goods?”
Bakrie was said to have received 100 percent of the votes for his Golkar chairmanship after all of his challengers dropped out of the running. Obviously not voting were the splinter organizations of Golkar that deemed the Bali congress illegal and as a ploy by Bakrie to reposition himself for another five-year term as the party’s leader.
Source: Jakarta Globe
Photo: Facebook video screengrab
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