A test of leadership

A test of leadership

President Soeharto's accountability speech delivered to the
People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) yesterday must have been the
toughest he has had to prepare since 1973. The rosy anecdotes of
progress achieved under his leadership which peppered his
previous five accountability reports have gone. Achievements have
been overshadowed, in some cases even eliminated, by the economic
crisis that has gripped our country since the middle of 1997.

This year's speech did make reference to some positive
developments, but only after the President had discussed the
grave situation facing the country. A sense of optimism can still
be detected in his speech, but it is tempered with a reasonable
dose of reality.

He said the economy grew by a paltry 4.7 percent last year,
against an average annual growth of 7.1 percent in the previous
four years. Per capita income, in dollar terms, fell from $1,155
to $1,089 in 1997. These two indicators alone tell us enough
about the bleak state of our economy and negate some of the
progress crafted by Indonesia since the last accountability
report was presented in 1993. It is possible, with the crisis
expected to worsen before it gets better, that the economy will
grind to a halt or register negative growth this year. If that
happens, income will drop even lower.

This is indeed the worst economic crisis Indonesia has faced
since Soeharto came to the helm of our country in 1968 and
launched his five-year development plans a year later. The plans
were designed to lift the nation toward prosperity from the
abject poverty into which it had fallen. The Sixth Five-Year
Plan, which ends on March 31, 1999, is still expected to pay
dividends, if only dividends that fall short of the high returns
to which the nation has become accustomed.

In the corporate world, a chief executive officer not only
presents a report of accountability, he or she is grilled by
shareholders over company performance during the reporting
period. Shareholders can choose to accept or reject the report.
If they are very displeased, they can also replace the chief
executive. The shareholders' meeting is essentially a place to
test the chief executive's leadership.

The MPR General Session is not terribly different from a
shareholders' meeting, in which the MPR represents the
sovereignty of the people -- our nation's shareholders. Soeharto,
in his capacity as the country's chief executive, yesterday gave
an account of his leadership for the past five years. Since all
five of the MPR political factions had agreed to return Soeharto
to power before the session began, we can assume they would
accept his report, as they have done in all previous General
Sessions.

But this does not mean that the factions should blindly
endorse it. At the very least, the 1,000 members of the MPR
should give the report a thorough and critical look, before
giving their stamp of approval. That much is owed to the 200
million people they are supposed to represent.

While Soeharto's report was frank and honest about the
triumphs and failures of his leadership, it did not address some
of the underlying factors which are now widely accepted as having
contributed to, if not caused, the current crisis. Many senior
government officials have admitted that corruption, collusion,
nepotism and monopolistic practices have exacerbated the crisis.
Some people would go further and say that these factors caused
the crisis in the first place. Although not mentioned directly in
the report, we can still take heart because many of these issues
have been addressed by the IMF reform package to which President
Soeharto reaffirmed his commitment.

While we firmly endorse Soeharto's appeal to refrain from
seeking scapegoats, the MPR has a duty to identify factors which
are responsible for, or have exacerbated, the present crisis.
Laying the foundations for clean government and good governance
is the greatest contribution the MPR can give the new government.