page_title: 2019 Indonesian general election
section_title: Debates
hierarchical_section_title: 2019 Indonesian general election / Presidential election / Campaigns / Debates
caption_attribution_description: English: Selamat Datang Monument with 2019 Indonesian Election countdown, this particular area was crowded with supporters of both presidential candidates and their supporting parties.
context_page_description: General elections were held in Indonesia on 17 April 2019. For the first time in the country's history, the president, the vice president, members of the People's Consultative Assembly, and members of local legislative bodies were elected on the same day with over 190 million eligible voters. Sixteen parties participated in the elections nationally, including four new parties.
  The presidential election, the fourth in the country's history, used a direct, simple majority system, with incumbent president Joko Widodo, known as Jokowi, running for re-election with senior Muslim cleric Ma'ruf Amin as his running mate against former general Prabowo Subianto and former Jakarta vice governor Sandiaga Uno for a five-year term between 2019 and 2024. The election was a rematch of the 2014 presidential election, in which Jokowi defeated Prabowo. The legislative election, which was the 12th such election for Indonesia, saw over 240,000 candidates competing for over 20,000 seats in the MPR and local councils for provinces and cities/regencies, with over 8,000 competing for the People's Representative Council seats alone.
context_section_description: The KPU scheduled five debates to be held in 2019, the same number as in 2014. DPR member and PAN Central Committee chairman Yandri Susanto proposed that the debates be held in English, but the KPU decided that the debates would be held in Indonesian. The debate questions from the KPU were provided in advance to the candidates. The Prabowo campaign team criticised it as belittling the candidates.
  The first debate held on 17 January 2019, focused on legal, human rights, terrorism and corruption issues, and was moderated by Ira Koesno and Imam Priyono. Both candidates described their visions during the early stages. Jokowi admitted the difficulty of solving old human rights cases and promising to strengthen law enforcement institutions. Prabowo shared this sentiment and called for an increase in the salaries of civil servants to reduce corruption.
  The second debate was held on 17 February 2019, with topics covering energy, food, infrastructure, natural resources and the environment, and was moderated by news presenters Anisha Dasuki and Tommy Tjokro. This time, both candidates utilised more numbers and statistics. In one segment, Jokowi questioned Prabowo on his stance about unicorn companies, briefly confusing Prabowo and led to internet memes related to the animal unicorn. On the topic of agrarian land reform, Jokowi pointed out Prabowo's ownership of 340,000 hectares (840,000 acres) of land. Prabowo stated that he held the land under cultivation rights instead of full ownership and was willing to return it to the state.
  The third debate, involving the vice-presidential candidates, covered education, health, labour, social affairs and culture, and was held on 17 March 2019. On 30 March 2019, the fourth debate was held, which was centred around defence and foreign policy. The fifth and final debate was held on 13 April 2019 and focused on economics, public welfare, industry, trade and investment.
caption: Election countdown at Selamat Datang Monument.
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