Less-is-more philosophy would do our lawmakers good

Benget Simbolon Tnb., Jakarta

"Nemo dat quod non habet" is a Latin saying that means nobody can give what they do not have. Although it is a Latin saying, people here will easily understand that a person needs to first have money before they can give it to others.

But unfortunately, the meaning of the saying seems to have escaped our legislators at the House of Representatives (DPR). Despite the country's predicament the legislators still have the heart to ask for bigger salaries.

This week they persisted with their request for an allowance of Rp 10 million (US$1,000) in addition to their Rp 40 million monthly salary. If it were to be approved, they would be on salaries of more than Rp 50 million, excluding the other perks that they get as members of the House.

Previously this year, they received a pay rise of more than 300 percent from about Rp 12 million per month to about Rp 40 million per month.

The legislators, surely, are not aware of the very poor condition of this country over the last seven years. Such a condition can be seen and felt in almost every aspect of life here. The economy is not doing well. The number of jobless, which according to the Central Statistics Agency (BPS) has reached some 40 million people, is on the rise. Thus, poverty is also increasing among communities.

Different from other countries in this region, Indonesia is still shunned by investors due to its record of corruption, excessive red tape, higher costs of labor and uncertainties in its legal system and security situation.

Indonesia, therefore, has only undergone a shaky growth of about five percent, which is not enough for it to disentangle itself from the multi-crisis of seven years ago.

Apparently, the legislators did not consider their performance before asking for the additional allowance.

Indonesian Parliament Watchdog Society (Formappi) said in its report on Monday that during this year -- the first year of its five-year term -- the House of Representatives' performance was very poor. They had only endorsed 10 pieces of legislation out of the 55 targeted bills, while its budgetary and supervisory functions failed to live up to people's expectations.

Formappi chairman Tommi Legowo said that the legislators had also done very little to force the government to find other ways to reduce the burden on the state budget other than by increasing the fuel prices. This had led to the government's increasing of fuel prices by 126.6 percent on average, with kerosene -- which is used as a cooking fuel by the nation's poorest people -- rising almost threefold from Rp 700 to Rp 2,000 per liter.

Teliti, another legislative watchdog, previously made a similar criticism of the legislators. It reported that many of the legislators had also moonlighted, including as brokers between businesspeople and the government, distracting their attention from their main job in the House.

Their persistence has again proved that their demand from the country is based more on personal -- or their respective political interests -- and less on the interests of the public.

People will certainly feel regret over the fact that the legislators they chose to represent them in the House have ignored their interests. They could no longer trust them to fight for their interests in the legislative body.

Considering the hardships the general public are now enduring, the legislators' salaries were already sufficient. It is now time to say enough is enough. It is time for them to make use of what has been given to them.

They might think they need to more in order to improve the welfare of the public, or their parties, but people are seeing that excuse as a way of disguising their intentions.

Now, instead of trying to get more and more, they should try to understand the philosophy of "less is more", which once was promoted by German intellectual Ludwig Mies Van der Rohe. People should not be discouraged with "less", as with their creativity they can use it to achieve more.

The poor people -- who have made the headlines recently but failed to get the attention of the legislators -- may not know the name of this less-is-more principle. But surely, they have long practiced such a philosophy, knowingly or unknowingly, in their everyday lives.

Once in an interview, a journalist asked a poor woman how she made ends meet. The woman said: "My family needs some 50 liters of rice every month. But our income can only buy 45 liters. So, every day before cooking, I just take out a handful of the rice I'm about to cook and keep it in a separate place as savings. Later that month, when we experience a shortage, I will turn to use it. Sometimes we make it last for more than one month."

The journalist got another answer on the less-is-more principle from a farmer. "We were experiencing an irrigation water shortage. So what we did was to use the available water for irrigating our rice fields in turn, so that more land could be used for rice cultivation," he said.

The poor are aware they have "less". But instead of demanding more from others they have used their creativity to achieve more.

As their fellow nationals, the legislators should also be aware of the condition of their country, which is currently too poor to give them more. In such a condition, all people, including the legislators are required to make sacrifices, with a view to, one day, enabling our country to give us more and more. Part of that sacrifice would be to look at "less" as though it had the potential to be more. Not through an additional bonus but through hard work and creativity.

The author is a staff writer of The Jakarta Post.