Golkar upbeat hard work will pay off on election day

By Dwi Atmanta

JAKARTA (JP): Golkar is confident of another landslide victory in the May 29 general election, given the amount of work it has put into consolidating grassroots support these past three years.

Under chairman Harmoko, Golkar has recruited an army of 12 millions cadres in villages and kampongs across the country. Their job is to amass votes in their respective neighborhoods.

Come the election campaign -- slated for April 27 to May 23 -- these cadres will be making door-to-door visits to canvass support for Golkar.

An army of Golkar functionaries in the meantime will be campaigning among strategic groups -- such as farmers, businesspeople, youths, intellectuals and mass media workers.

Cadres and sympathizers will have the chance to meet top Golkar leaders at the mass gatherings, which will not be rallies however because they are forbidden.

These gatherings will be given massive media exposure to enhance Golkar's image and curry public favor.

Information on the preparations for the election has been flowing ceaselessly from rural villages to Golkar headquarters in Slipi, West Jakarta, where a blend of government officials, business heavyweights, intellectuals and hundreds of employees are gearing up for the months ahead.

"We are facing a war we have to win. That goal needs lengthy and consistent preparations, otherwise we might let our rivals land an unexpected blow at the last minute," Rully Chairul Azwar, head of Golkar's election team said.

The election will pit Golkar against the United Development Party and the Indonesian Democratic Party, with 425 of 500 seats in the House of Representatives on offer. The other 75 seats go to the Armed Forces, whose members do not vote.

Golkar won 68 percent of 97.8 million votes in 1992, giving it a fifth consecutive landslide majority in the elections held under President Soeharto.

This year the organization is gunning for 70.02 percent of the 124.7 million people eligible to vote. An estimated 15 million people will be going to the polls for the first time.

The target means Golkar has to retain its past support and find 17 million new backers.

Java is receiving special treatment as Golkar is fielding high-profile figures among its legislative candidates on the island. President Soeharto's children, Bambang Trihatmodjo and Siti Hardiyanti Rukmana are representing Jakarta and Central Java respectively, while the party's chairman Harmoko and secretary- general Arie Mardjono will fight for West Java and East Java respectively.

Priority

Rully says Golkar considers the consolidation of neighborhood communities its top priority in the election.

Each coordinating cadre is responsible for monitoring Golkar and non-Golkar sympathizers, an activity which has raised protests from other political groups who have branded it a political census.

"Our cadres are just making a list, and other political groups are allowed to do the same. They are only breaking the law if they intimidate their neighbors into voting for Golkar," Rully says.

Indonesia adopts the floating mass system which bars all political groups from campaigning below the regency level.

Coordinating cadres duty is called dasa karya (the 10 mission), which obliges him or her to recruit nine other voters. They can be immediate family members, other relatives or neighbors.

"Canvassing can take place in bed, the kitchen or at the well," Rully said, referring to methods of recruiting voters from among one's own family and neighborhood.

Rully says that the target of garnering 70.02 percent of the total votes was not determined from the top but arrived at after studying reports and pledges from cadres, he said.

"Psychologically, those cadres will prove whether their reports were reliable or not on election day," says Rully, a House member who tops the legislative candidates list in Bengkulu.

Golkar's support in any village always serves as an indicator of the success of a village chief. It is accepted that a village chief can expect a second eight-year term if Golkar increases its vote in his or her area.

Golkar is also counting on the support of the Civil Servants Corps and the Armed Forces, the organization's two founding pillars, and their families.

The former comprises six million employees who work in the bureaucracy and state-owned companies. Its leadership has decided that all civil servants and their families are expected to channel their political aspirations through Golkar.

Such synergy enables Golkar to enjoy the use of bureaucracy facilities, but Rully denies that Golkar has grown into a non self-reliant political group.

"Self-reliance does not suggest Golkar must break its historic relationships with the civil servants and the Armed Forces. A self-reliant political group is one that manages to implement its programs.

He said that Golkar was poised to retain its huge majority to make sure that it has the dominant say in the country's policy- making process.

"We have a mission which needs implementing. The bigger our share of the vote, the smoother the process will be in achieving our goals," Rully says.

The majority landslide is not the reason why the two minor parties have been left out in the cabinet, according to Rully.

"The President has the prerogative to choose his assistants. If he happened to pick his assistants from Golkar, maybe that was because he had the full cooperation of Golkar members," he says.

President Soeharto, who took office in 1967, chairs Golkar's powerful board of patrons. Non-Golkar figures were last in the cabinet in the 1972 to 1978 term.