...but others not, call it clandestine
JAKARTA (JP): One of the promises that Ismail Hasan Metareum made shortly after being elected chairman of the Moslem-based United Development Party (PPP) recently was he will recruit as many intellectuals as possible.
"We need their contributions in our efforts to strengthen the party," he said.
Zarkasih Nur, also of PPP, said the party's executive board has followed up on Ismail Hasan's plan and held a meeting with 50 intellectuals from the country's most prestigious campuses.
"This is a new tradition for us. These intellectuals may not be included in the executive board, but they have agreed to provide us with input in running the party's programs," he said.
When pressed to reveal the names of the scholars, however, Zarkasih refused. "They cannot explicitly declare that they are involved with PPP, because they are still bound (by their positions, mostly as civil servants)," he told The Jakarta Post.
Precautions are also needed, Zarkasih said, because PPP does not want to repeat old mistakes such as recruiting intellectuals for the party's think tank only to find later on that they had their eyes trained on the party's chairmanship or leadership.
"There are people like that, so we have to be careful," Zarkasih said. Although he did not name names, he was apparently referring to economist Dr. Sri Bintang Pamungkas, the party's enfant terrible, who was recruited because of his magnetism for the younger people but later "betrayed" the leadership by contesting the government-backed leader Ismail Hasan.
Likewise the smallest party, the populist Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI). Dr. Sukowaluyo Mintorahardjo claimed many scholars have expressed an interest in joining PDI because it presents a different, courageous voice amidst the country's political stagnation. "We offer a venue for efforts to improve society and implement the state-ideology Pancasila," he asserted. "Not positions, but struggle."
When asked to name the scholars, however, he managed to come up with only the names of noted economist Kwik Kian Gie and educator Mochtar Buchori.
The picture was entirely different for the ruling political grouping, Golkar, who already has a strong tradition of recruiting intellectuals.
Dr. Marwah Daud Ibrahim, a leading member in the executive board, easily prattled off a long-list of names of intellectual members of the group. It includes cabinet ministers and legislators who hold doctoral degrees or are even professors at prestigious universities, as well as businessmen or members of intellectual associations.
The list also include noted figures such as former minister of education Fuad Hassan, and many others.
"There is a strong bond Golkar enjoys with scholars, especially because the decision-makers in this organization respect opinions and suggestions put forward by the intellectuals," she said. "We know our voice is heard."
"Golkar uses its think-tank well," she concluded.
The impression is, that results from the apparent "gap" between those who walk proud when they enter Golkar and those who have to "sneak" into PDI and PPP, there is more than the question of which organization appreciates the intellectuals better.
Instead, it poses the questions of why it becomes a matter of prestige and pride to join Golkar, and why joining PDI and PPP calls for secrecy. The answer may well rest with this: uneven distribution of power. (swe)