Disband Korpri and Dharma Wanita

Disband Korpri and Dharma Wanita

The Indonesian Civil Service Corps (Korpri) and the
Association of Wives of Civil Servants (Dharma Wanita) would be
better disbanded, as the following reasons show:

1. They were set up by the New Order regime to confirm the
Functional Group's (Golkar's) supremacy by means of restricting
the freedom of association of civil servants and laborers. These
organizations do not give any benefit; on the contrary they are
just a burden to their members, because they collect levies in
the form of salary deductions or donations.

2. They lead to inefficiency because their presence only means a
waste of money, energy and time. As for Dharma Wanita,
considering that the chairperson is also the wife of the leader
of the institution concerned, the couple are just like a king and
queen. Perhaps this situation was intentionally created by the
New Order regime in an attempt to establish a feudalistic and
authoritarian system. Because of this likeness to a king and
queen, Dharma Wanita has often been the source of irregularities.
Promotion in position and decisions on projects, for example, can
be discussed and decided by the husband and his wife alone.

This system has therefore allowed corruption, collusion and
nepotism to thrive, owing especially to the unconditional
authority inherent in the system. The queen, the wife of the head
of a state body, has often misused the state's facilities and
behaved as if she were more powerful than her husband. Some
violations have included the use of office cars and the mixing up
of official and private bank accounts. Once there was quite a
stir when an entourage of Dharma Wanita members from the
communications ministry unit went on holiday to Thailand.

Today, all institutions established by the New Order for the
sole purpose of stifling democracy and ensuring the
sustainability of Golkar's absolute majority must be disbanded.
Otherwise they will continue to use facilities for the pro-status
quo forces to block the advance of the reform-minded forces.

Besides, as Golkar is considered the source of all problems
faced by the nation, Korpri and Dharma Wanita should also be
construed in the same manner. All of them will only hinder the
progress of the reform movement.

HARYO MATARAM

Jakarta