An awkward predicament

What should come first in matters of state administration and politics: the interest of one's country or that of one's party? The answer seems obvious enough. To quote a popular saying attributed to the 19th century English statesman Benjamin Disraeli: My loyalty to my party ends where my loyalty to my country begins.

The logic behind this reasoning is clear enough. Communist and other totalitarian politics aside, political parties exist for the main purpose of serving as repositories of the people's aspirations and giving voice to those aspirations in the national parliament, where they are either supported or contested.

Ideally, therefore, a president, or speaker of the national assembly or a leader of whatever other major institutions of state there may be should be able to place him- or herself above all party interests so as to be able to act with fairness and wisdom in cases of vying interests. One way to best ensure such an impartiality is by relinquishing his or her position within the party.

Basic as the issue may seem, the debate that it has sparked among politicians and the public at large in the past few weeks has refused to die down. A poll, conducted during the past week by the Jakarta newspaper Kompas shows that the majority of Indonesians polled -- some 77 percent of them -- agreed with the generally accepted view that people in prominent public positions, such as a president or vice-president, a speaker of the House of Representatives (DPR) or People's Consultative Assembly (MPR), should step down from their party positions for as long as they remain in public office.

The problem, however, is that party politics in this country, and indeed in Indonesian politics in general, still rely heavily on the personal charisma of their leaders, both for keeping the political parties intact and for securing votes in the general elections. The present dilemma shows that party politics in Indonesia have progressed little, if indeed there has been progress at all, since democratic reforms were initiated in the wake of the downfall of the Soeharto regime in 1998.

Beset as they are by rifts and leadership problems, practically all the major political parties represented in the DPR and MPR at present can hardly afford to loose their top leaders. For those reasons it does not look very likely at present that the national parliament -- the House of Representatives -- is in any mood to adopt legislation to bar Indonesians in leading public positions from maintaining important party positions at the same time.

Obviously, however, the issue is an important one for Indonesians to keep pursuing. For the present, it seems that the nation will have to make the best of the situation and be content to remember that the deal may not be such a bad one, all things considered. After all, a healthy party life is basic to the growth of a healthy democracy and must be ensured, whatever the cost.

Unless this is achieved, the consequences could well be grim for the growth of democracy in Indonesia. All that can be said for the moment is that it is high time that Indonesia's political parties start weaning themselves off the personal charisma of their leaders and rely more on developing realistic platforms and programs. In the end, with a younger and better educated generation of Indonesians emerging, a prolonged dependency on a leader's charisma will most certainly only work to the disadvantage of the party or parties concerned.