Controversy besets election bill, political conservatism

Controversy besets election bill, political conservatism

By Mulyana W. Kusumah

JAKARTA (JP): Debates on the bill concerning general elections
have been going on within and outside the House of
Representatives (DPR) amid systematic attempts by certain groups
to sustain the political privileges they enjoyed during the rule
of Soeharto's New Order administration.

The DPR special committee for political bills, for example,
came to an agreement on Nov. 26 that the proportional
representation system would be adopted for the election to be
held in 1999.

The choice of the PR system was a repeat of what happened some
30 years ago, when major political parties such as the Indonesian
Nationalist Party (PNI) and Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) rejected the
district system proposed in an Army seminar in 1966 on the
grounds that the Indonesian people are not yet ready to adopt
such a system.

Putting forward different reasons in a similar vein, the
House's four factions -- the ruling party Golkar, the Indonesian
Democratic Party (PDI), the United Development Party (PPP) and
the Armed Forces (ABRI) -- rejected the proposed district system
as set forth in the bill on general elections, which had been
drawn up by a Ministry of Home Affairs team. Golkar, for example,
argued that in the past general elections people were familiar
only with the symbols of the contending parties.

According to the elucidation of the bill on general elections,
a combination of district and proportional systems will be used
for the election of DPR members and local councilors who are
based in electoral districts. The mapping of the districts will
be based on the existing maps of regencies, municipalities or
other administrative units of the same level, and their
population figures. One administrative unit can be further
divided up if its population is more than 600,000.

This elucidation also postulates that the proposed district
system will have a positive aspect in that it will allow people
to determine their own candidates and that a candidate collecting
the majority of votes will win a seat in their electoral
district.

Under the proposed district system, the relationship between
the people and their representatives will be closer. This close
relationship would strongly guarantee the establishment of the
representatives' accountability to their constituents.

The use of the proportional representation system for the 1999
general election means the repetition of the election pattern of
the past six general elections under the Soeharto regime. As
such, it may reproduce the values and practices prevailing in
past elections, some of which are as follows:

* The PR system will be oriented to the maintenance of the old
political format which manipulated the working mechanism of a
party system in order to reinforce the government which is a long
way from public control, sustain the low accountability of the
representatives and obstruct the improvement of the voters' sense
of identification with their representatives and the government
resulting from the election.

* There will be no open and stiff competition among candidates in
each electoral district. People's real political support of the
candidates will be based on quasi-support of certain political
parties.

* The chairperson of a political party will have greater
sovereignty than the voters because he will have the authority to
determine which of the candidates will become DPR members or
local councilors in accordance with his political objectives.

This matter will certainly obstruct the process of internal
democratization within a political party and will enable its
leaders to develop their own reward system which may not be in
line with the aspirations of the constituents. In this context, a
candidate, through corrupt, collusive or nepotistic practices,
can assure election as a legislator or local councilor without
having to compete with party peers or with candidates from other
political parties as long as he or she secures strong access to
the party leaders.

Another political tendency which may arise is the recalling of
legislators whose performance is considered out of line with the
political wishes of the party leaders. The independence of the
legislators in voicing critical aspirations individually may at
any time be put at risk.
* The adoption of the PR system will obviously entail great
risks, especially if the upcoming general election does not
simultaneously bring about three tiers of people's representation
(DPR and councilors at provincial and regency/mayoralty levels)
on the grounds that simultaneous election of the three tiers will
be highly burdensome to the administration of the election, while
the preparation period is quite brief.

Because candidates under the PR system will be more
representative of their political parties rather than their
constituents, aspirations of the regions for the introduction of
the widest regional autonomy possible or for the establishment of
a federal system of administration will be less accommodated and
the people will have an obviously much weakened sense of being
represented.

* Because competition among political parties will be more
dominant than that among candidates, there are wider
opportunities for leaders of bureaucracy-related organizations
such as Korpri for civil servants and Dharma Wanita for their
wives to encourage their members to support a certain political
party and also for political institutions of the military, such
as Babinsa, to recommend that local people support a certain
political party.

* The people's political control over election processes will be
hindered even at an early stage such as in the composition of
lists of candidates, which is fully entrusted to political
parties, and the appointment of members of election executive
committees.

Aside from the reasons mentioned above, the reason put forward
by DPR factions in rejecting the adoption of a district system in
the upcoming election -- that the people are not yet ready for
such a system -- has indeed belittled Indonesian voters, whose
political knowledge, understanding, awareness and capacity have
now been much improved in comparison to the conditions of a few
decades ago.

The factions seem to be bogged down in their "political
conservatism", ignoring dynamic political aspirations and
rejecting progressive ideas towards the institutionalization of
democracy.

It is more obvious, therefore, that in such a situation there
is greater urgency now for reinforcing external institutions of
election supervision such as the Independent Committee for
General Election Monitoring (KIPP), which will not only monitor
ballot casting and counting, but will also, along with other pro-
democracy forces, continue to fight for the prerequisites for a
free and democratic election.

Of course, the credibility and acceptability of such external
supervisory institutions will be determined by how well they have
passed the political tests they have been put to because their
activities are obviously not "seasonal" and not intended to seek
popularity when a choice of a concrete political role fails to be
formulated. Neither are these activities simply intended to find
a new political stage.

The writer is secretary-general of the Indonesian Independent
Committee for General Election Monitoring.