Indonesia’s presidential candidates, incumbent President Joko Widodo and his challenger Prabowo Subianto, went head-to-head in the second presidential debate — the first without the VP candidates — last night as they were grilled on issues related to food, energy, natural resources, the environment and infrastructure.
While determining the winner of the debate is an entirely subjective affair, in true Indonesian netizen spirit, both candidate’s supporters quickly got to work by claiming victory for their side by putting together some dank memes.
In one trending hashtag from this morning, #JokowiBohongLagi (Jokowi lies again), Prabowo’s supporters pounced on the president when he made claims that don’t appear to be backed by facts, such as when he said there have been no forest fires in Indonesia for the past three years (there were actually 370 recorded forest fires in 2018 alone).
https://twitter.com/Amiriado1/status/1097272286615228416
The forgotten hero wkwkwkwkkwkwk He actually forgot about his own staged appearance after a forest fire. Strange!
Some also disproved of Jokowi’s claim that his administration has lowered corn imports to 180,000 tons in 2018, while official data showed the government actually lowered it to 731,000 tons.
Emang bnar2 pembohong… #JokowiBohongLagi pic.twitter.com/gAC7b9UuNc
— Ghandi (@AndiZoso) February 17, 2019
And then, still under the same hashtag, some went into conspiracy theory mode by accusing Jokowi of wearing an earpiece and using a pen-shaped communicator during the debate.
https://twitter.com/Adra_perantau/status/1097314368138620928
Conversely, Jokowi’s camp is claiming victory for the much-coveted millennials’ vote in what has probably become the most dissected moment of last night’s debate. At one point, Jokowi asked Prabowo what infrastructure he would like to build to support Indonesia’s unicorns (start-up companies valued at US$1 billion or more). Prabowo then clarified the term with Jokowi before answering, which many of the latter’s supporters took as his lack of understanding on the issue, giving birth to the popular hashtag #02GagapUnicorn (02 — Prabowo’s designated candidate number — stutters about unicorns)
https://twitter.com/bethiiiiii/status/1097338843991134208
https://twitter.com/Kartikaribet/status/1097344958225309697
Duta unicorn Indonesia 🤣🤣#PrabowoNgaco pic.twitter.com/W0JF9F9ifP
— IG: ulinyusron (@ulinyusron) February 17, 2019
Unicorn ambassador of Indonesia
The moment was so overplayed that the Gerindra party, which Prabowo chairs, defended its leader on Twitter.
Bukan enggak tahu unicorn, tapi pak Prabowo ingin memastikan kata-katanya, karena pelafalan kata unicorn nya kurang terdengar jelas. https://t.co/1DP1vbGpz5
— Partai Gerindra (@Gerindra) February 17, 2019
It’s not that [Prabowo] doesn’t know what unicorns are, but Prabowo wanted to clarify the question, because [Jokowi’s] pronunciation of the word unicorn wasn’t heard clearly.
Meanwhile, some of Jokowi’s facial reactions to Prabowo’s claims have become memes on their own:
https://twitter.com/marrezarifa/status/1097328102777057281
Jokowi after you give him false data
👦girl, you the one and only#CurhatPilpres2019#DebatSebel pic.twitter.com/VIk6VjrpMk
— Hamba Allah (@ffdillah__) February 18, 2019
https://twitter.com/anisathasya00/status/1097167933669691392
Me: typing…
Doi: Online
Me: typing…
Doi: Online
Me: Sent
Doi: Last seen today at 19:30
Me: pic.twitter.com/TngqY7hOyq— XO, 𝓰𝓻𝓪𝓬𝓮✨ (@anzzlegrace) February 17, 2019
Who do you think won last night’s debate? More importantly, what memes would you use to describe the clash? Hit us with your best memes in the comments here or on our Facebook page.
