Golkar's next challenge

After Golkar's emotion-filled convention on Tuesday, it seems that the heavy downpour in Jakarta the next afternoon came as a shower from heaven to douse the heat left by the race involving the party's five presidential hopefuls.

The eight-hour convention in Central Jakarta that ended well past midnight on Tuesday yielded (ret) Gen. Wiranto, former commander of the Indonesian Military (TNI), as the party's presidential candidate.

Tuesday's assemblage marked the culmination of a 14-month process initiated by party leader Akbar Tandjung, who conceptualized the party convention as a vehicle for finding the best possible leader for the nation by accepting candidates from both inside and outside the party.

The outcome, however, was a bitter defeat for the man who is widely considered to be one of the nation's most talented politicians. As it turned out, the other candidates proved more difficult to beat than the charges of corruption that had been leveled against him for years.

When Akbar was freed from corruption charges in February, his chances of victory at the convention appeared wide open. But at the crucial moment, a little past midnight Tuesday, his fate was sealed. It was an outright victory for Wiranto, who had crisscrossed the archipelago in the past six months to seek support.

Nevertheless, the battle was interesting to watch. On the field were five candidates, including businessman Aburizal Bakrie and media mogul Surya Paloh. Another candidate was Prabowo Subianto, a former Army general who is a son-in-law of president Soeharto. Bakrie caught people by surprise by snatching 118 out of 547 votes in the first round, which put him in the third slot, but it was not enough to pull him through to the second round that eventually pitted Akbar against Wiranto.

And whatever the eventual outcome, Tuesday night's convention was a Golkar showcase. The political machine that Soeharto set up and the dissolution of which was demanded by the reformist movement when its chief patron fell from grace in 1998, has held an unprecedented national political event.

The sight of two presidential hopefuls sitting side by side accompanied by their spouses right after the vote count was unparalleled indeed in this country. Only several hours earlier, the two were involved in a battle of wits together with the other Golkar presidential candidates. Like it or not, Golkar should be commended for holding this high-level political lesson.

For 30 years under Soeharto, Golkar made a show of how to win a battle without really fighting -- thanks to the repressive nature of the Soeharto government. Now it seems it is well into the process of undergoing total transformation by teaching the people how to accept defeat with grace.

Accepting defeat is a difficult pill for the nation's leaders to swallow. For 32 years under Soeharto, differing in opinion was more or less taboo. The maxim was: anyone who differs in opinion is an enemy. Hence, many are inclined to see in Golkar's convention a stride forward toward the political maturity of the party's leaders as well as its constituents. Only time will tell if this is true.

The downside is that the two strongest contenders in the convention are tainted candidates. Wiranto has been indicted for human rights abuses in East Timor and Akbar has yet to completely distance himself from the recent corruption charges.

For some, the convention also had an ironic twist. Initially designed to reverse Soeharto's top-down leader recruitment system, it ended up yielding another military leader, the open and democratic manner in which it was conducted notwithstanding.

This is especially interesting, since another current popular leader and presidential aspirant, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono of the Democratic Party, is also a retired military general. Although retired military generals are civilians in legal terms, the call of the now defunct reformist movement for a civilian government has been all but inaudible.

As Wiranto relishes his newly won victory, further battle fields await him. With 315 votes against Akbar's 227, he seemed to have secured most of the votes from the 32 provincial executive boards of the party, each having three voting blocks. If this is true, Golkar's grass roots are saying that they need the strongest contender to run against Susilo of the Democratic Party and his running mate Jusuf Kalla. Golkar seems to be aware that the Susilo/Kalla pair is currently the front runner in the polls and is accepted by the market as well. Therefore, Golkar is looking for a figure to match Susilo. And the choice is Wiranto.

One thing though has remained unchanged after the April 5 legislative election, which ended with a loud and clear message: the people want change. If mother nature managed to douse the emotional heat of the convention on Wednesday, will the convention be able to provide an answer to people's demands?