Coalition a victory for people's power

Coalition a victory for people's power

As vote counting continues, people are predicting the shape of
the country's new political map. Political analyst Wimar Witoelar
shares his views.

JAKARTA (JP): One week after the elections, concern over the
snail's pace of the vote count is matched only by increasing
confusion about coalitions.

Of the two issues, the coalition issue is by far the more
important. Having clean and fair elections capped by a quick and
clean vote count is like having a successful medical operation.
But failing to use the people's electoral mandate to form a new
and clean government would mean "the operation was successful,
but the patient died".

Because of the strange mathematics of the People's
Consultative Assembly (MPR) and Golkar's use of money politics,
the possibility of Habibie being elected president by the MPR is
still very real.

A report in The Washington Post said: "in many other
countries, a leader who presided over a party that could win only
20 percent of the popular vote nationally might resign on
principle, or at least not seek reelection."

But if Habibie were a man who cared to read the mood of the
people, he would not have hung around this long. Clearly, the
public must force out the current regime. If this does not occur,
these emergency elections which came about out of a unique set of
circumstances would lose their meaning.

We still remember the chain of events which led to last week's
polls. It started with the students marching on the legislature
and forcing president Soeharto to resign on May 21, 1998.

It happened with such speed that nobody was ready to pick up
the pieces, particularly the opposition, which is supposed to
take over power in such a situation.

The people made their will very clear. No more of Soeharto's
corruption and abuse of human rights. Yet no politician rallied
to the people's cause, allowing Soeharto to pass the reins of
government over to Habibie, who turned out to be the nation's
premier entertainer. Like Emperor Nero who played the fiddle
while Rome burned, Habibie would have been funny if so many
people had not died as a result. The press, the International
Monetary Fund and the world's governments watched Habibie's
performance as we lost our security, our dignity and our money.

Clearly this was not what we wanted, and by mid-1998 various
groups, from students to senior statesmen, were calling for
Habibie's removal from office and replacement by a leader
"acceptable to the people".

This was easier said than done. After the revolutionary events
of May 1998, the effort to put the reform movement back on track
bogged down in legalistic details and a strong money-driven
defense by the Soeharto-Habibie-Wiranto triad.

They bought all the best lawyers money could buy, used
government money to try to resurrect Golkar, Soeharto's political
machine and rained terror down upon East Timor, Aceh, Ambon and
Sambas. A coherent political opposition became difficult because
all the noise made it difficult to tell friend from foe.

Then all of a sudden, the general election, an idea which had
been tossed around by conventional political thinkers, took shape
and distracted people from the immediate removal from office of
Habibie and the immediate trial of Soeharto.

The law framing the elections had a shameful beginning, forced
through by a MPR political machine driven by the Indonesian
Military and Habibie, adding the lives of students lost in the
Semanggi tragedy to the roster of student heroes killed in the
Trisakti shooting. Students and intellectuals were skeptical, but
then something occurred which made the elections respectable.
What was that something?

Quite simply, the promise that this time politicians would
stay true to the demands of reform. We had been disappointed once
before, just before the Semanggi tragedy in November 1998.

Three widely respected leaders, Megawati Soekarnoputri, Gus
Dur and Amien Rais, refused to rally to the side of the students
then occupying the MPR building.

Now, in May 1999, these three leaders' respective political
parties, the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI
Perjuangan), the National Awakening Party (PKB) and the National
Mandate Party (PAN), stated explicitly they were allied in a
united front against the New Order, now represented by Golkar and
the Habibie government.

This revived hopes the elections would lead to the removal
from power of Habibie and Golkar. That is why it is confusing to
hear that some PAN officials have considered the possibility of
forming a coalition with Golkar. It is equally confusing to hear
some Golkar officials are considering a coalition with PDI
Perjuangan.

The only coalition which makes sense is PDI Perjuangan-PKB-PAN
as the ruling coalition, with Golkar and the rest of the parties
comprising the opposition. It was a relief to hear Amien Rais say
PAN would never enter into a coalition with Golkar. Amien further
said such a coalition would be a betrayal of his principles and
integrity. A party whose platform stipulates a complete break
from the New Order regime could hardly turn around and embrace
Golkar, which, along with the military and the bureaucracy, was
one of the three pillars of the now-defunct regime.

Still, we wonder which parties will form alliances ahead of
the meeting of the MPR and the presidential election? For
ordinary citizens, the paramount questions are who will be
Indonesia's next president and what kind of government are we
going to get?

A PDI Perjuangan victory in the elections means a triumph for
Megawati and the people's will. The PKB's strength is Gus Dur's
leadership and the gentle morality of Nahdlatul Ulama, the Muslim
organization led by Gus Dur. The emergence of PAN means deserved
recognition for Amien Rais and an opportunity for a pluralistic
middle-class.

A coalition demolition of the New Order would be a gift to the
people; a reward for bearing the burden of the current economic
crisis and decades of oppression. The coalition must be a victory
for people's power and an affirmation of reformasi.