What’s at stake in Indonesia as the world’s third-largest democracy elects a new president?

By NINIEK KARMINI
Associated Press

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — Indonesia, the world’s third-largest democracy, will open its polls Wednesday to nearly 205 million eligible voters in presidential and legislative elections, the fifth since Southeast Asia’s largest economy began democratic reforms in 1998. Indonesia, a sprawling archipelago of 17,000 islands that’s home to more than 270 million people from about 1,300 ethnic groups, is bastion of democracy in Southeast Asia, a diverse and economically vibrant region of authoritarian regimes, police states and nascent democracies.