Indonesia's team faces critical challenges

By Jusuf Wanandi

JAKARTA (JP): It is a general consensus to date, that the Abdurrahman Wahid-Megawati Soekarnoputri combination as President and Vice President is the best combination of leaders the country could have at this juncture. They might not have any experience to govern, but none of the other potential leaders for the presidency have this experience.

With his divide and rule tactics, it was former president Soeharto's legacy to remove every possible competitor as soon as a potential leader emerged. Therefore, there are not many potential leaders for the post, and none have that much experience in governing. Only Habibie had the opportunity to gain some experience, but he did not have the necessary qualities to become a leader.

The current leadership has also emerged through a democratic election -- the first after 44 years. A lot of questions were asked before the elections about Abdurrahman's limitations due his health. But he is now widely accepted as the President that can unite the nation following a period of political polarization and conflicts, social divisions and miseries. He started well by establishing a "national unity" Cabinet, accommodating all major parties, regions, ethnic backgrounds and religions.

As Vice President, Megawati obtains a chance to prepare herself much better if she wants to run again in the future for the nation's top job. It is widely understood that she lost the presidency because she did not want to play politics, while she needed to build a coalition to obtain the majority of the votes in the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR).

But there are critical challenges ahead for Indonesia, and the big question is whether this legitimate and popular government is up to those challenges. Abdurrahman's health is a constant cause for concern, while Megawati's leadership is still untested.

The national unity government is a brilliant and politically astute move by Abdurrahman, but what about coordination and control? In particular, the economic team is considered to be rather weak, disparate and with no experiences, while the economy has never been Abdurrahman's strength.

He needs real teamwork. This is important because some very critical choices have to be made by the whole team as one unit. Furthermore, the Indonesian economy has not yet recovered compared to progress begun by other nations in the region affected by the crisis. The most critical problems for recovery, namely restructuring of the banks and the problem of corporate debt, remain unresolved.

Therefore, Abdurrahman's idea to have two advisory teams on the economy -- one on macroeconomics and the other on microeconomics -- has a lot of merit, especially in helping him with ideas and feedback to formulate policies together with the relevant economic ministers. This effort needs to be supported because it could help fill in some of the lacunas of an inexperienced and rather weak economic team.

In addition to the economy, the most urgent issue that Abdurrahman's presidency has to face is the problem of the relations between the center and the regions. Aceh is of course the most urgent issue because Aceh is in the heartland of Indonesia. Aceh cannot be compared to East Timor, which is peripheral in Indonesian public opinion. The consequences of losing Aceh could not be imagined for the continued existence of the Republic of Indonesia.

After some hesitations and misjudgements about the seriousness of the problem in Aceh, and after one wrong statement about a comparable situation between Aceh and East Timor to the need and the content of a referendum, Abdurrahman has now gotten his act together on this issue. He has sent a fact-finding mission to the province comprising of some of his ministers, and while he is formulating a more comprehensive policy on Aceh, he is stressing the need to reduce the tensions and has withdrawn some of the military from Aceh.

Pressure from the military, including his civilian minister of defense, to put some parts of Aceh under emergency rule again has been rejected by Abdurrahman. The strategy did not help before and instead caused increased fighting and tensions. Aceh should not become another Revolutionary Government of the Republic of Indonesia (PRRI)/Permesta for Indonesia. The President is adamant that a political solution and not a military one should be aimed for. But he has also stressed that independence is not an option for a future Aceh. Public opinion is behind him on this point.

In the meantime, Abdurrahman received support from President Clinton, and most importantly from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the three most important partners in the region, namely China, Japan and South Korea, for the territorial integrity of Indonesia, including Aceh, and for a peaceful resolution of the conflict.

What he should do now in his comprehensive plan is to have a two-pronged approach to the problem. On the one hand he should engage in negotiations with Aceh leaders about their wishes and requests. In this case, a new situation has arisen in Aceh, as the leaders of the Aceh Independence Movement (GAM) no longer solely represent the Acehnese. This attitude has been revealed by the willingness of the people to push for a referendum through political and peaceful efforts.

The new leadership in Aceh is still in a state of formation and consolidation. It comprises representatives from various religious groups, non-governmental organizations and student leaders, with some participation from local politicians and civil servants. Even the GAM leadership is divided, and that should also be taken into consideration in forming a representation of Aceh in the process of negotiations.

The dialog and negotiations therefore, probably should not only be confined to an official one, but should be complemented by an informal "second track" comprising NGOs and student leaders from both Aceh and Jakarta.

The second effort is to calm down the emotions by accommodating some of the deepest grievances of the Acehnese. Two things need to be done here. First is to bring the perpetrators of human rights, and especially those responsible for the killings of innocent people, to justice. They must be brought to civilian courts because military tribunals lack just as much credibility in the eyes of the Acehnese as for Indonesian people in general.

Abdurrahman should begin by focusing on what happened during the Habibie presidency. How far back this subsequently has to go will depend on whether the initial efforts are going to be credible or not.

In this case, as in other atrocities in Indonesian history, especially under the Soeharto regime, a national reconciliation committee as has been implemented in South Africa and in some Latin American countries, should be seriously considered. This was Abdurrahman's idea some 20 months ago, and now that he is the President of the Republic, it will be feasible if he is willing to give his full support to his earlier idea.

Of course, bringing some of the officers to civilian courts is not easy for the Indonesian Military (TNI) to accept. But there is no other effective way to bring calm to the situation in Aceh. And in the end it boils down to justice being meted out to abusive officers versus the unity of the Indonesian nation as a whole. The TNI leadership should accept this reality. This is also a critical political decision by Abdurrahman in order to establish civilian control over the armed forces.

In this context public opinion will be overwhelmingly supportive of the President. The TNI leadership has to understand that for their authority ever to be reestablished again, strong action on their part against abusive elements of their own officers and soldiers will be critical.

In relation to this point, only a complete repatriation of East Timorese refugees from East Nusa Tenggara and immediate absolute control of the militia is a prerequisite for normal relations and cooperation by Western countries with the military.

Another issue of grievance for the Acehnese is the realization of the special status for their province, a move which was passed into law and has been reaffirmed by the Assembly. This has to be implemented in good faith and quickly worked out into a viable program. This special status was promised to the Acehnese from 1956, but was never implemented. It may be too little too late now, but it still makes sense as a gesture of seriousness and willingness of the central government to give Acehnese their home rule, which has been their wish since joining the Republic in 1945.

In the medium term, an Abdurrahman-Megawati government might be the only civilian government that is going to be acceptable to the Indonesian Military in bringing professionalism to TNI.

How and how soon that is going to be done will depend on how the younger TNI generation is pushing for their own professionalism, and how much the government can back them up with political and also financial and material support. To create a professional army is not only costly, it also needs time and external political support to give TNI its rightful and honorable task in defending the Indonesian nation from external threats in the future and to make them capable of doing so.

Only with Abdurrahman's and Megawati's good rapport and understanding, as well as conservative political views that recognize TNI's history, achievements, as well as deficiencies and shortcomings, can a process of professionalization really begin to happen in TNI.

The writer is the chairman of the Supervisory Board of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies.