The Grand Coalition

Last July, President Susilo Bambang Yudoyono (SBY) won 60.80% popular votes in the Presidential Election, ensuring his re-election for the next 5 years.

However, this is not enough, because in the Parliamentary Election last April, SBY's Democratic Party only secured 26% of the seats in the lower house of Parliament (DPR), therefore he needs to form a coalition with other political parties.

Initially, four Islamic based political parties, i.e. PKS, PPP, PAN and PKB, have vowed to support and provide additional 30% seats in the lower house of Parliament (DPR).
But this is still not enough for SBY, so he made a deal with the opposition party PDIP, 3rd. winner in parliamentary election, PDIP recognized SBY's re-election as President, in exchange for Democratic Party's support for Taufiq Kiemas, husband of PDIP's chairperson, to become chairman of the Parliament (MPR) on 3 October.

SBY's wish for more parliamentary support was materialized last Wednesday when the Coordinating Minister for People's Welfare Aburizal Bakrie was elected as Chairman of the Golkar Party, 2nd. winner in the parliamentary election.

With the support from PDIP & Golkar, SBY's government will have the support of more than 85% of the seats in parliament. Critics feared that this will weakened law enforcement, which can be seen from SBY's appointment of 3 new leaders of the independent Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) and the mysterious status of the Bank Century case.

For detailed media reports, please click here, here, here, here.

In view of the above, I hope that the grand coalition built by SBY and his party with all the other parties would enable the upcoming government to work much harder and better for the very best interests of the people & the country of Indonesia.