Indonesia's team faces critical challenges

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.