Barbarians in the House

Barbarians in the House

Those acquainted with politics looked on in amusement. The
majority of those who had held their representatives in something
like reverence stared in bemusement.

The cacophony of the assembly turned ugly on Wednesday as the
esteemed members of the House of Representatives nearly came to
blows during a debate over the fuel price hike. Free speech and
opinion veered toward a free-for-all.

A shouting match quickly turned to pushing and shoving as
legislators tried to reach the House speaker, all the time waving
their mobile phones about as dangerous weapons.

Surrounding the speaker's dais, their actions and taunts were
more akin to professional wrestlers than learned gentlemen
entrusted with the affairs of state.

That the whole thing was caught on camera and broadcast hourly
on television only made the whole thing worse. The beneficiaries
of the country's democracy were teaching their subjects all the
wrong lessons.

Democracy is a learning process. Wednesday's outburst helped
unlearn the civility of our nascent democracy. With life getting
tougher by the day, a brawl in the most revered hall of
Indonesia's democracy will only leave millions wondering whether
democracy is worth the sacrifice.

No one said democracy would be easy. Mohammad Hatta, the first
vice president, conceded in 1956 that "democracy needs
practice ... there must be some practice for a nation not
accomplished in this exercise at the national level".

Even great visionaries of the system such as American James
Madison noted that democracies have always been spectacles of
turbulence and contention. But what transpired at the House was
not "practice". It was a process of implosion.

We hope Wednesday's embarrassment will not damage the people's
trust in our democratic institutions. It would be good to remind
ourselves of Plato's charge to remain faithful in the belief that
the trouble with democracy was not due to the absence of the rule
of law, but that the wrong people were running it -- those who
had little virtue.

Virtue, honor and a code of conduct should be intrinsic among
those who wear the House insignia pinned to their lapels.

Another late great politician of the 1950s parliamentary era,
Mohammad Natsir, highlighted three errs made by Indonesia's
legislators that undermined the democratic process.

The first was a decay of idealism that allowed pique and greed
to rule. The second was a fading of the line between acceptable
and unacceptable behavior to accomplish one's objectives.

The third was the absence of a sense of justice that allowed
the wrong man to be put in the wrong place.

Natsir's observations are as true today as they were when he
made them 50 years ago.

The ends being sought by the legislators may have been noble,
but the means by which they pursued them was not. Even
schoolchildren can resolve their difference without having to
resort to fighting.

Given the vibrancy of Indonesia's society, more contentious
issues than the fuel price increases are likely to arise in the
coming months.

Already perceived publicly with a cynical eye, without
decorum, respect for dissenting opinion and a sense of duty the
House will become an assembly of disorder and disaster.

And sadly, despite the unnecessary brouhaha, legislators still
could not resolve their differences over the fuel price
increases. So what was all the rage for?

Politics is the art of getting other people to do what you
want without them knowing it. This sort of finesse defines great
politicians.

Such savvy -- the kind that separates great politicians from
the average seat warmers in the House -- is clearly still lacking
among our legislators.