PKB Eyeing VP Post

Jakarta, Apr 10 (Antara) - The Nation Awakening Party (PKB) is targeting the post of vice president in the July 9 presidential election. Its general chairman, Muhaimin Iskandar, told the press here on Thursday that PKB must be realistic, despite the fact that it has already promoted two presidential candidates, including musician Rhoma Irama and former constitutional court chief justice Mahfud MD. According to various quick vote counts, PKB finished fifth in the legislative elections on Wednesday, garnering more than nine percent of all votes. "PKB will be realistic. Certainly parties with larger numbers of votes will nominate their presidential candidates," he said. Based on the vote count, the three parties that won more votes than the remaining nine parties were PDIP, Golkar and Gerindra, and all of them have already named their presidential candidates. With regard to vice presidential candidates, Muhaimin said his party has many qualified members, including Rhoma Irama and Mahfud MD. He noted that PKB has already conducted intensive discussions with two presidential candidates from other parties, but he declined to identify them since the process is still ongoing. He said PKB wishes to build an effective and permanent coalition based upon a common vision, mission, ideas and programs, and hopes PKB could fulfill the promises that it made during the campaign by participating in the future government. "Certainly we will choose a position for which we have a chance to fill, namely the post of vice president," he said. (*) reporting by sigit pinardi