Does Golkar need to be dissolved?

Does Golkar need to be dissolved?

By Joe Fernandez

JAKARTA (JP): Demands to have Golkar dissolved reached their
peak when Golkar offices were set on fire in a number of towns in
East Java. Last Thursday this newspaper reported the "support"
stated by faction leaders at the legislature; they said in effect
that Golkar should be maintained for the sake of solidarity.

To understand this polemic a number of factors should be taken
into consideration, including the legal basis of dissolving
parties and fairness regarding the privileges enjoyed by Golkar
under the rule of the New Order.

The 1999 law no. 2 on political parties states that the
dissolution of a political party must fulfil a number of
conditions.

The dissolution of a party, which is in the authority of the
Attorney General, is only one kind of punishment for a party
violating the law, as mentioned in clause 17.

The Attorney General can also punish parties by freezing their
executive board, withdrawing their rights to join elections or
apply only administrative penalties such as terminating aid from
the state budget, as stated in clause 18.

In practice the dissolution and freezing of political parties
under this law is very difficult because of its utopian
prerequisites. "Severe violations of the law" only occur when a
party is found to have aims which run counter to the Pancasila
state ideology or the 1945 Constitution, or if it is found to
have spread communism, Marxism or Leninism, or have accepted
contributions from foreign parties.

Other violations such as receiving individual contributions of
more than Rp 15 million a year, or corporate contributions of
more than Rp 150 million a year, are rarely considered a serious
breach of the law -- as almost all major parties joining the last
election are suspected of having violated the above clause.

What is of greater concern is the suspicion that almost all
political parties which gained seats in the last election have
violated clause 18, item 4 regarding the obligation of parties to
have all income and contributions audited by a public accountant.

Only one party -- unfortunately not Golkar -- has conformed
with clause 15 regarding the obligation to report the
contributions it received at the end of each year, or 15 days
before elections, or 30 days after elections, to the Attorney
General and have the contributions audited by a public
accountant.

Clause 15 must be considered part of a party's accountability
to the Indonesian public, because it has enjoyed taxpayers'
money. Public accountability must be the utmost priority compared
with formal or administrative accountability submitted to the
Attorney General.

It is highly unfortunate that until now the Attorney General
has never revealed the results of audits by public accountants of
all registered parties; therefore the public has yet to know of
the parties' financial condition.

Not surprisingly, this has led to suspicions of "money
politics" and the rise of new scandals. Defense minister Mahfud
MD alleged that Golkar had received Rp 90 billion from the State
Logistics Agency in the last election.

This is where the Attorney General must be transparent to
avoid more mud slinging among the political elite, regarding
allegations of illicitly gained funds used by political parties.

Suspicions towards legislators from the Akbar Tandjung-led
Golkar are still high because of the privileges they are still
enjoying, in the form of accumulated assets and capital.

Therefore if Golkar, which has renamed itself the "New Golkar"
party feels it has changed its character since the New Order
days, it should take the initiative to announce the individual
wealth of its members who sit in the legislature, as is the
practice in many countries.

This should start with Golkar's high-ranking executives.

The Golkar image which Akbar wishes to promote involves a
small change in the party's structure. However this only touches
the surface. When introducing the Golkar Party ahead of the last
election, Akbar was very proud of the removal of the Board of
Patrons (Dewan Pembina) at the central level, the Board of
Advisors (Dewan Pertimbangan) at the provincial level and the
Board of Councilors at the regency or township level.

But this is far from enough.

One must question the ownership of assets, or the transfer of
ownership of assets under Golkar. Assets of the government and
provincial administrations which under the New Order were taken
over by Golkar, because of its proximity with those in power, now
remain under its control -- such as the land and premises of both
the Central Board office and of a number of provincial offices.

One should further question Golkar's many benefits in the form
of "personal" support from government offices, which was earlier
so easy to acquire.

The basic relevant question here is: Has the Golkar Party
really cut off all its "perks" in the form of facilities,
government support and that millions of civil servants?

Other parties would surely be jealous of the vast facilities
that Golkar has enjoyed so far. Is it fair for the Golkar Party
to continue to exist while it has and is still enjoying the above
facilities, and spending what it has gained from its special
financial sources?

Golkar's exclusive access to assets and capital was possible
because of its earlier structure. A secretariat chief on its
Board of Patrons, for example, was ex-officio the secretary of
the liaison office of state bodies at the State Secretariat --
which meant easy access to state facilities.

The Chairman of the Board of Patrons, then president Soeharto
himself, was entitled to reap the harvest from the "money tree";
this comprised the foundations (yayasan) under his control -- the
Yayasan Dana Karya Abadi (DAKAB), Yayasan Amal Bakti Muslimin
Pancasila (ABMP), and others.

Of course huge sums of money have been gathered from DAKAB and
ABMP alone through the decades-long "contribution" from civil
servants' salaries throughout the country or "requests" of funds
from state corporations, in particular the fuel company Pertamina
and the State Logistics Agency.

Those were only two of so many "money machines" made available
to Golkar at that time.

Then there was the position of Golkar treasurers, held by some
of the country's renowned business people. They all gained
facilities when serving under Golkar chairmen. They all have
businesses and close linkages with conglomerates which grew under
the Soeharto regime.

It is now up to Golkar to take a close look at itself. Has it
really made a clean break with its past? Or is it still
discreetly enjoying privileges through established networks?

Depending on the party's moral accountability and credibility,
can it elegantly erase its stigma and rise with a truly new name
and paradigm, to become a modern party with integrity?

The end of East Europe's communist parties should be a
valuable object lesson for Golkar.

The problem is that Golkar is still using its old paradigm.
The only difference is that it used to be the ruler; now it is
the loser, and no longer has the support of the military or the
bureaucracy.

The writer is a senior researcher at the Jakarta-based
Institute for Policy and Community Development Studies.