Good and bad news on reforms

Former U.S. ambassador to Indonesia Paul Wolfowitz gives his assessments of changes in Indonesia over the past year and of future prospect. Now dean of the Paul Nitze School of Advanced International Studies at John Hopkins University in Washington D.C., Wolfowitz talks to The Jakarta Post correspondent Yenni Djahidin. A related article appears on Page 5.

Question: How do you assess events in Indonesia over the past year?

Answer: It's very much the good news, bad news story, and it's hard to tell which is dominant, which is more important. The bad news is the evidence of very disturbing social tensions. I don't know whether they are deep or not, but the manifestations are really quite horrible. To see Indonesians killing one another is really terrible. And I know there is a belief that some of this may be provoked by provocateurs, but provocateurs cannot succeed unless people are able to be manipulated. So, that part and not to mention the economic crisis, which, of course, is part of the reasons why people are easily provoked.

On the positive side, there seems to be a completely free press, there is this profusion of political parties, almost too many, but it's much better too many than only one or essentially one. I think some of the best news in Indonesia is largely unreported in the international press because they are things that don't happen. A year ago, when the students were ready to march on Monas square, they and Amien Rais decided not to in order to avoid bloodshed. If they had marched, you would have weeks of news about Tiananmen in Jakarta. Since they didn't march, there's really no story, even about what, I think, remarkable leadership Amien Rais exercised at that time.

Similarly, since the Army didn't shoot students, there wasn't a story about what the Army did, or rather what they didn't do. I think, the armed forces deserves a lot of credit for the restraint. The fact that you have these very large political movements like PDI Perjuangan (Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle), PAN (National Mandate Party) and PKB (National Awakening Party), any one of which could have tens of thousands of people demonstrating every day but they are not. These are the kind of restraints that don't get reported very well.

The economic problems have seen some progress, but it's very modest and it's going to continue modest until you have a government that can deal decisively with a lot of issues that hangover from the past.

Q: Could things have been better?

A: It's hard to judge. Considering the economic crisis, the riots that preceded Soeharto stepping down, you had to have a period of transition in which some things could be achieved, but miracles could not have been achieved overnight by anybody. The question is less whether more could have been achieved in the last 12 months than whether the last 12 months have been used as well as they might have been used to lay a foundation for this whole election process and what's coming afterward. And, I think, the results are sort of mixed.

I think a great deal has been achieved. I'm impressed by the amount of thought that has gone into preparing the new election law, and just the process of getting ballots out to 27 provinces, and how many... 250,000 polling places. That's a massive task.

And, the society and the government have had an enormous amount to deal with in last 12 months. But, it's not going to be enough just to have a free and fair counting of the ballots on June 7. What's important is that from the process emerges a government that has a real credibility. And I'm not sure you have a process that is designed to do that. It looks a little too much to me like the Italian or the Israeli system which has a profusion of parties producing governments that typically don't have any clear mandate. So, that's the challenge.

Q: Where is Indonesia is heading with the elections?

A: I hope Indonesia is heading to become the third-largest democracy in the world. I hope that it's heading toward a society that heals its divisions, instead of exacerbating its divisions. If it does those two things, then it will emerge from its economic crisis and perhaps emerge -- although there's a lot of work to be done, just the magnitude of the bank problems are staggering -- from this with a stronger economic foundation than when it begun.

There were real achievements when it began. I don't think it's fair to dismiss everything that happened in the last 30 years as of no account. I think there has been real economic progress in the country. Part of the problem was the institutions and the political system didn't progress with the economy. So, that's my hope. There remain question marks whether that will be achieved and there is the possibility these divisions are getting worse and problems like East Timor and Aceh proliferating around the country.

Q: Your prediction for the elections?

A: It's very hard to predict. It's such a confusing process. It could easily go wrong even though everybody is trying to make it go well. With 48 parties on the ballot, you have a very indirect road from the June 7 elections to the MPR (People's Consultative Assembly) finally selecting a president. So, it would be difficult in a very mature democracy to make your election system work well. We're talking about a country that hasn't had a real election for more than 40 years.

I think everybody is trying very hard. I'm impressed at how hard people are trying. And I hope they will succeed. But if you ask my prediction, I'd still have to say it could go wrong, there is a lot of ways it can go wrong. So, we have an expression in English, "knock, knock on wood." I'm hoping it would go well.