2029 Presidential Race Could See Gibran vs Sjafrie Backed by Prabowo

Minister of Defense Sjafrie Sjamsoeddin together with Vice President Gibran Rakabuming Raka welcomed President Prabowo Subianto at Halim Perdanakusuma Airport (doc Setneg)

JAKARTA - The Executive Director of the Lingkar Madani Indonesia (LIMA), Ray Rangkuti, stated that the 2029 Presidential Election (Pilpres) has the potential to become an arena of competition between Gibran Rakabuming Raka and Sjafrie Sjamsoeddin to accompany Prabowo Subianto.

"From my observation, the 2029 presidential election is a fight between Vice President Gibran and Defense Minister Sjafrie to accompany President Prabowo," Ray said in a public discussion held by the DPP Indonesia Youth Congress at the Tamarin Hotel, Central Jakarta, Monday, March 2.

According to Ray, the 2029 presidential election will not be easy for Prabowo to win. He assessed that a number of programs currently being run by the government had decreased in performance, so it had the potential to affect the level of public support in the future.

Ray also highlighted the emergence of Sjafrie, who was considered to have a "20-year" political appearance pattern, which he said was similar to the pattern of consolidating power that Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono had built at the time.

Meanwhile, the results of the latest survey by the Indonesian Public Institute (IPI) show that a number of new faces are included in the presidential candidate exchange 2029. IPI researcher, Abdan Sakura, said that some of the names that entered the top 10 include Sjafrie Sjamsoeddin, Governor of DKI Jakarta Pramono Anung, Governor of North Maluku Sherly Tjoanda, Governor of West Java Dedi Mulyadi, to the Minister of Finance Purbaya Yudhi Sadewa.

In the survey, Sjafrie was in 7th place with an electability of 7.5 percent. He is competing closely with a number of regional heads, such as Anies Baswedan (8.5 percent), Pramono Anung (7.8 percent), and Dedi Mulyadi (7.9 percent).

Meanwhile, the peak of electability is still occupied by Prabowo Subianto with 22.3 percent, followed by Gibran Rakabuming Raka (12.2 percent), and Ganjar Pranowo (9 percent).

Abdan explained that the emergence of these new faces was influenced by a number of factors such as leadership, reputation, track record, media publication, integrity, as well as visions, missions, and work programs. In Sjafrie, for example, the leadership and reputation indicators reached 44 percent, track record 17 percent, recommendations from the environment and media 12 percent, and integrity 10 percent.

He assessed that, although big names still dominate public perception, there is a gap between the level of eligibility and electability. This shows that voters are becoming more rational and have not yet completely made a choice, so that the 2029 political dynamics are still very open, especially if there is a change in coalition or the absence of a major figure.

The IPI survey was held on January 30-February 5, 2026, with 1,241 respondents aged 17-65 years in 35 provinces. The method used was multistage random sampling with a margin of error of 2.78 percent at a 95 percent confidence level.