President Joko Widodo and Gerindra Chairman Prabowo Subianto yesterday showed the nation that there’s no need for divisiveness and bitterness in next April’s presidential election, and aww wasn’t that hug sweet, you guys?
In what is hopefully going to be the most enduring iconic image that we’ll remember the 2019 election for, Jokowi and Prabowo shared a group hug with pencak silat martial artist Hanifan Yudani Kusumah after the latter won an Asian Games gold medal in Jakarta yesterday.
Carrying the Indonesian flag as he ran a victory lap, Hanifan ran up to the VIP section to first hug Prabowo, who is the Indonesian Pencak Silat Association chairman and was dressed appropriately so, and then asking Jokowi to join in the warm embrace to the rapturous applause of spectators.
It was a picture perfect moment, one that was shared on both Jokowi and Prabowo’s Instagram accounts with messages about unity in times of political polarization.
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“We three — Hanifan, myself and Pak Prabowo — hugged in the cover of the red-and-white (Indonesian flag),” Jokowi wrote in the caption.
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“We may have differences between us, but one, if it comes down to national interest we must be united,” Prabowo wrote in the caption.
The hero behind the hug implied that he was well aware of his role in producing this powerful political gesture.
“So that the people of Indonesia will know that there’s nothing between Prabowo and Jokowi. [The hatred] is just engineered by people who are envious of their success. As a silat athlete I must show the social nature of the sport. We must keep our hearts together. We are one nation, one country, we shouldn’t let insignificant issues divide us,” Hanifan said, as quoted by Detik yesterday.
Indeed, while the 2014 presidential election between Jokowi and Prabowo was a hard fought, often bitter campaign, the two politicians never went at each other’s throats with personal attacks (though we can’t say the same about their supporters). In fact, neither held grudges against the other after the campaign, at least publicly. Remember that time they went horse riding together?
It’s probably naïve to think that next year’s election is going to be all roses just because of this iconic hug, but positive messages like this will hopefully help ensure a relatively peaceful presidential election campaign, rather than the constant barrage of divisive politics we’ve been bombarded with for the past few years.
