Abdurrahman Wahid implements half-hearted autonomy

Question: What challenges are facing the plan to implement regional autonomy?

Answer: Great challenges, obviously, despite the fact that the autonomy concept was already contained in the 1945 Law No. 1.

Imagine, thinking and wishing for something for 50 years and only seeing it turning into reality, God willing, next year.

For 14 years after 1949, we tried to uphold democracy in Indonesia. In many ways we were successful. But after 1959, when (founding president) Sukarno issued his decree reinstating the 1945 Constitution, we found ourselves drifting even further away from (our goal of) democracy.

All that time we were given promises that were never kept. That's why the outer regions then lost their patience, and expressed this in the form of establishing their own regional administrations.

Look at the string of rebellions that have taken place since independence, the DI/TII (Islamic state), the regional differences which peaked with the Permesta/PRRI rebellion.

All those were demands for autonomy. And what did they get? Not autonomy, but more centralized power. Under Sukarno and Soeharto, any hopes for autonomy faded away, despite it being always touted in their promises. Soeharto issued a law on regional administration in 1979, but it was only during (the administration of) B.J. Habibie that the idea received greater attention.

Now, the administration of Gus Dur is implementing the law halfheartedly.

Q: What do you mean halfheartedly?

A: What has his administration done to facilitate the implementation of the rulings that he himself introduced?

The two laws concerned need a number of implementing regulations. The government once promised to put it into effect in March 2000, but postponed it to April, then to September. How many new rulings has he produced? Only a few, while actually one law needs dozens of directives.

And now, in a recent meeting with local legislators, Gus Dur said "regional autonomy has been too hastily arranged." This shows how unprepared he is. So what we have now is a government that is ill-prepared to implement the laws, and regional administrations who are also far from ready.

All this time the government sapped dry all of the regional resources and only returned (a small portion) back to the regions. This way, the regions became very much dependent on the central government. Law No. 25 was introduced to correct this -- some authority will be returned to the regions so they will be able tend to their own financial affairs. The regional administrations will then be able to collect their own taxes and levies without going through the central government as they have always done.

But I wonder if the replacement of finance ministers has dissipated the country's resolve (to implement the autonomy policy). This should not have happened. The ministers should be able to come and go, but policies should remain the same.

We have only one month left, (it will not be) possible to produce the regulations necessary for the implementation of the autonomy policy in such a short time.

Q: How ready is Indonesian society for autonomy?

A: The regions are basically divided into two: those rich in natural resources, and the poor regions. The rich regions, such as Aceh, Riau, East Kalimantan and West Papua or Irian Jaya are those that made the early demands for autonomy because they have been the largest contributors to our GNP.

They believed that reducing the flow of income to the central government would automatically increase the flow to their own treasuries, thus enabling them to run development programs as they see fit. The other regions are, on the other hand, heavily dependent on the central government. They are not ready for autonomy.

Another problem relates to human resources. It is obvious that urban centers have better prepared human resources. The larger the cities, the better prepared they are. Look at Jakarta, Makassar or Medan. The farther away from the urban centers, the more ill-prepared the regions are. We would have a Java - outer regions dichotomy because the regions that are relatively ready are those in Java.

Another factor to be looked at is cultural resources -- which show that no region in Indonesia is ready for autonomy. We are so used to centralization, to paternalism, authoritarianism, that we are no longer able to see alternatives to those patterns.

The (long-standing) culture of power has destroyed the ability to be independent. We are so used to being controlled as regards even the smallest minutiae -- pencils, paper and typewriters were sent to the outer regions from Jakarta for the sake of uniformity and centralization.

Let us take an example of a school in the hinterland of Kalimantan, where its desks, tables and chairs are imported from Jakarta despite the fact that the island is rich with timber while Java no longer has forests. What happens is that people cut the Kalimantan trees, ship the timber to be processed in Java before shipping back the goods to Kalimantan.

So the least ready factor here is our own culture. We have failed to cultivate a culture that would support democratization and autonomy.

How regions will fare in the autonomy drive will depend on combinations of factors. There are certainly regions with certain factors that should enable them to progress and prosper under the autonomy policy. As human resource is the most dominant factor, then urban centers will show a better response to the autonomy policy.

Much will depend on the wisdom of the regional leaders. If the rich regions are led by skilled persons, those who place a premium on the interests of their people rather than on their own interests, then they will progress rapidly. Problems will abound in the regions which are rich in natural resources, but have poor human resources and cultural resources. This is where the worries about the possible emergence of local strongmen are justified.

So the three factors need to be looked at simultaneously. Rich regions can either progress rapidly or not progress at all depending upon the wisdom, or lack of it, of their leaders.

Let's look at Malaysia, whose history since 1959 shows a marked contradiction to ours. In the period of 1945-1959, Indonesia had good leadership, one that was very democratic and put such importance on the people's interests that the leaders were willing to live simply. That was our golden age, despite the simplicity of life.

Now Malaysia is enjoying such a period -- even if they were hit by the same crisis that hit us, they rebounded sooner and are now on their way back.

Q: A sociological theory says that, in the past, a region's prosperity hinged on its geographical location, on whether it was a coastal area or a hinterland. Does this theory have any relevance given your assessment of the three factors above?

A: Yes, although we also need to discuss several new dimensions to the theory. The first dimension is (the presence of) the conspiracy of centers of power. We need to differentiate between economic powers and political powers, which existed mostly in the hinterland as most of the centers of (traditional) kingdoms were in such regions.

The centers of economic activity were found mostly along the coastal areas, because the agricultural system that we have developed is traditional in nature and even now is very much at subsistence level. Therefore, only a limited amount of agricultural products are traded. But with the growth of import- export and other economic activities, the coastal areas would certainly developed further, and have done so in the past.

The dichotomy of inland-coastal areas, however, gave rise to various problems including cultural friction. People said that culturally, the coastal regions were more egalitarian and moderate, while the inland areas tended to be more feudal and the powerholders tended to be more repressive.

Q: Because the autonomy policy will be based on Level II regions (the regencies), may we conclude that coastal regencies will progress more rapidly than inland regencies?

A: That is possible. But there will be variations because not all coastal regions are already developed. Maybe they are in Java, but not so in the outer islands. In South Sulawesi, for instance, it is the inland regions that are relatively more developed. That is because of the backwardness of the means of production in the coastal regions, while inland regencies have greater expanses of agricultural production.

In fact, we can say that the poorest and the most downtrodden people in Indonesia are fishermen; their income is the lowest of all. In coastal areas, too, we see differences between coastal cities and coastal villages. The fishermen live in coastal villages, which are much poorer than inland villages. (Ali Said Damanik)