Palace Responds to SMRC Survey Showing Decline in Prabowo's Approval
The Presidential Palace has responded to the decline in public opinion survey results regarding President Prabowo Subianto. Saiful Mujani Research and Consulting (SMRC) noted that the Gerindra Party Chairman has lost points in both satisfaction levels and electability over the past nine months.
Minister of State Secretary Prasetyorkan Hadi stated that they are not worried about the survey results. “From the beginning, we have always conveyed that we do not work for the sake of seeking surveys,” he said in a video statement from the Presidential Secretariat on Thursday night, 30 July 2026.
The government, Prasetyo said, is confident that the programmes introduced by President Prabowo are beneficial to the public. Consequently, all ministries and agencies will continue to implement the programmes proposed by the President.
“We never look at or work solely to chase a survey. But from what we are doing, we are confident that the people will be able to accept what we have implemented as part of our campaign promises,” he added.
He further noted that the government understands Indonesia’s shared national aspirations: to become more advanced, prosperous, and self-sufficient across various sectors, including food security, energy, industrialisation, and downstreaming.
The survey institution, SMRC, previously released its latest electability results on Wednesday, 29 July 2026. The results indicated that President Prabowo Subianto would not win a general election if held at this time.
Prabowo only occupied second place in the semi-open election simulation conducted by SMRC. “If the presidential election were held now and Prabowo ran as a candidate, it is unlikely he would be re-elected,” said SMRC Executive Director Deni Irvani in his statement this Wednesday.
According to Deni, the survey titled “Electability of Presidential Candidates” showed that Prabowo Subianto obtained 14.5 per cent of the respondents’ votes. He trailed behind the Governor of West Java, Dedi Mulyadi, who held the first position with 35 per cent of the vote.
Deni explained that over the last nine months, Prabowo’s electability in the semi-open simulation dropped from 34.9 per cent in the November 2025 survey to 14.5 per cent in the July 2026 survey. Meanwhile, during the same period, Dedi Mulyadi’s electability rose from 19.7 per cent to 35 per cent.
Deni explained that the survey population consisted of all Indonesian citizens with voting rights. Out of the sample, 749 individuals were randomly selected; those with telephones were interviewed via telephone (83.8 per cent), while those without telephones were interviewed face-to-face (16.2 per cent).
This proportion aligns with the population of mobile phone users and non-users. The survey’s margin of error is approximately 3.7 per cent. The final survey was conducted between 5 and 19 July 2026.