PDIP's Response to Ganjar Entering the 2029 Presidential Candidate Race
INDONESIAN Democratic Party of Struggle (PDIP) Secretary General Hasto Kristiyanto responded to the results of an Indekstat survey that released electability figures for presidential candidate contenders in the 2029 election. He said the presidential election is still far too early to discuss.
“What’s important right now is working for the people first,” he told reporters after the Soekarno Run event in the Senayan area, Jakarta, on Sunday, 15 February 2026.
Ganjar Pranowo made it into the top ten figures with the highest electability for the 2029 presidential race based on the Indekstat survey. The PDIP Central Board Chairman ranked sixth among presidential candidates in terms of electability if the presidential election were held today, at 3.7 percent.
According to Hasto, the appropriate focus at this time should be on substantive democracy. Such democracy, he said, emphasizes the interests of the people. He particularly highlighted the incident of a student who took their own life because they could not afford to buy a pen and school notebooks. Hasto declared the case a humanitarian blow to all Indonesians.
“So don’t reduce democracy to mere electoral matters, then spend every day only talking about elections,” he said.
Additionally, he acknowledged that surveys can indeed be used as a tool to measure public perception. However, according to him, survey results can only serve as a reliable reference when freedom of speech in a country is genuinely free and when checks and balances exist.
“As a result, in many countries surveys are used as a tool of power dogmatism,” he said.
PDIP, Hasto said, has never used surveys as a tool to build a bandwagon effect. Therefore, he emphasized the importance of political parties doing grassroots work by going directly to the people.
“So that the people develop the awareness to determine which party truly fights for their interests,” he said.
Previously, Indekstat released ten names on the candidate list with the question: “If the presidential election were held today, from these ten names, who would you choose as president?”
“The result is that Prabowo emerged as the figure with the highest score at 47.2 percent,” said Indekstat Konsultan Indonesia Head of Politics Saiful Muhjab on Thursday, 12 February 2026.
In second and third place, he continued, were West Java Governor Dedi Mulyadi and former Jakarta Governor Anies Baswedan. Dedi achieved an electability of 17.8 percent, followed by Anies at 11.2 percent.
In fourth place, Saiful said, was Finance Minister Purbaya Yudhi Sadewa with an electability of 4.9 percent, followed by current Vice President Gibran Rakabuming Raka at 3.9 percent.
“In sixth and seventh place are PDIP Central Board Chairman Ganjar Pranowo with 3.7 percent and Democratic Party Chairman Agus Harimurti Yudhoyono at 1.0 percent,” he said.
Next in line were PKB Chairman Muhaimin Iskandar and Minister of Youth and Sports who also serves as PSSI Chairman Erick Thohir. Both scored the same electability rating of 0.4 percent, followed by former vice presidential candidate Mahfud MD at 0.3 percent.