How political parties selected their legislators in 2004
\nelections<\/p>\n
Harry Bhaskara
\nThe Jakarta Post\/Jakarta<\/p>\n
Rather than \"ladies and gentlemen\", a provincial candidate for
\nthe House of Representatives once addressed an audience \"Bapak
\ndua dan ibu dua (father two and mother two).\"<\/p>\n
The candidate, an ojek (motorcycle taxi) driver who was
\nreading a prepared speech, should have said \"Bapak-bapak dan ibu-
\nibu\" instead of saying \"dua\" for the figure \"2\" after each of the
\nwords \"Bapak\" and \"ibu\" -- under the old spelling system.<\/p>\n
\"The candidate was a very talented leader,\" says Novi
\nNasution, a legislator of the Indonesian Democratic Party of
\nStruggle (PDI-P), \"unfortunately he had a limited education.\"<\/p>\n
This story came out in a discussion at book launch for
\nNomination and Selection Process of Indonesian Legislative
\nCandidates, edited by Syamsuddin Haris at the Hotel Ibis in West
\nJakarta on Friday. The book scrutinized local elections in 15
\ncities in six provinces including East Java, Banten, West
\nSumatra, East Nusa Tenggara, South Sulawesi and North Sumatra.<\/p>\n
Novi urged political parties to set up a short education
\nprograms before the 2009 elections for candidates like the \"ojek\"
\ndriver, whom she described as \"very brave\".<\/p>\n
Two other speakers, Syamsuddin Haris of the Indonesian
\nInstitute of Sciences (LIPI) and Hadar N. Gumay of Center for
\nElectoral Reform (Cetro), agreed that a limited education should
\nnot be an obstacle to people becoming legislators.<\/p>\n
With university graduates making up only 3 percent of a
\npopulation of 230 million people, Indonesia ranks among the
\nlowest-educated nations in Southeast Asia.<\/p>\n
Currently candidates who wish to stand for legislative
\nelections must have a minimum high school diploma qualification,
\nleading to the disqualification of many candidates after it was
\nfound they had faked school or university-level diplomas.<\/p>\n
Despite the ruling, however, low education levels are also
\nblamed for the poor performance of members in the House.<\/p>\n
The discussion concluded that other hindrances to democracy in
\nthe 2004 legislative elections included money politics, parochial
\nvoting, thuggery and an \"invasion\" of businesspeople entering
\npolitics to protect their vested interests.<\/p>\n
The speakers also drew attention to what they said were \"miss-
\nmatches\" in the electoral system. They agreed that the concept of
\n\"open elections\" where independents could stand, were more
\nrepresentative than the current system, which only allows
\ncandidates representing a set list of recognized parties to
\ncontest positions.<\/p>\n
\"This is something that we need to work out for the 2009
\nelection,\" Novi said.<\/p>\n
Syamsuddin said among his book's significant findings were
\nthat the major party, Golkar, tended to prioritize \"old faces\" in
\ncandidate selections as opposed to other parties, which often
\nlooked for new blood.<\/p>\n
\"Almost 90 percent of the legislator candidates were current
\nmembers of political parties,\" he said.<\/p>\n
Hadar said legislators' nominations and selection processes
\nalso left a lot of space for improvement.<\/p>\n
\"In some cases, nominations were decided by only a few
\npeople,\" he said, \"the whole process was still political party-
\nheavy. Alas, we know a democracy deficit is still plaguing our
\npolitical parties.\"<\/p>\n
The discussion was organized by LIPI, book publisher Gramedia
\nand the Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy.<\/p>",
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