Deadlock feared in constitutional amendment process
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
With two months remaining before the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) must approve the amended 1945 Constitution, fears of a deadlock grow after President Megawati Soekarnoputri's decision to push for a delay in the direct presidential election.
Political analyst Daniel Sparingga of the Surabaya-based Airlangga University (Unair) said Megawati's statement signaled her party's weak support for the amendment process.
As the country's biggest party, Megawati's Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan) heavily influences the amendment process.
"It's common knowledge that PDI Perjuangan and the Indonesian Military (TNI) faction want to review the entire amended parts of the Constitution from A to Z," Daniel said.
Megawati told her party on Tuesday to lobby for a delay in the direct presidential election, reasoning that voters were unprepared.
In the third amendment process, legislators had agreed on a direct election as demanded by the popular reform movement.
If the MPR manages to approve the amended Constitution by the August annual session, people may vote for their president in the 2004 General Election.
Waiting until next year's annual session was not an option due to the limited time available to prepare for the 2004 election, law experts have said.
PDI Perjuangan may therefore only need to bring the amendment talks into deadlock next month to achieve its goal of delaying the direct presidential election.
"It would just take PDI Perjuangan and the TNI faction to stop the entire process of constitutional reform," Daniel said.
PDI Perjuangan has been accused of foot-dragging before. The party took sides with the TNI when its free seats in the legislature met with public criticism last month.
Megawati's bid to postpone the election also came just one day after her party blocked efforts to set up a political inquiry into a graft case implicating Golkar's chairman Akbar Tandjung.
Analysts lambasted PDI Perjuangan's move as back-tracking on reform commitments over short term political interests. They suspect a political deal with Golkar, the country's second largest political party.
Golkar legislator Slamet Effendy Yusuf, the vice chairman of the MPR committee in charge of the amendment process, said his party "so far" still demanded a direct election by 2004.
Smita Notosusanto of the Center for Electoral Reform (CETRO) said that recent developments in the amendment process confirmed public suspicion that the MPR was unable to rid itself of vested interests.
Daniel supported Smita and said that an independent commission would be more credible to discuss ideas of the kind Megawati had proposed.
He added that discussions over fundamental changes to this nation require public participation and must exclude the political elite. "Major ideas should be discussed and approved by the people."
Analyst Arbi Sanit of the University of Indonesia said the MPR' amendment to the 1945 Constitution had lost credibility.
"The people's only hope is an independent commission that would take over the amendment process from the legislators," he said.
Asked whether the legislators would willingly surrender their authority to amend the Constitution, he said it was "unlikely".
Daniel said that in the event of a deadlock, the MPR would likely opt to return to the original 1945 Constitution.
This scenario he said could lead to a legal vacuum where new laws based on the amended Constitution would be made invalid.
He added that Megawati's argument for delaying the direct presidential election was reasonable, but the statement itself was inappropriate. "It (the statement) comes from someone who is directly affected by the changes suggested."
The President's bid to revise agreed articles of the amended Constitution however was not the first attempt. Legislators have considered revising other articles, explaining that some articles lacked coherence.