Letter to Gus Dur and Megawati

Letter to Gus Dur and Megawati

Although I am an old soldier and veteran of Indonesia's War of
Independence (1945-1949), I cannot consider myself an expert in
Indonesian politics. But I would like to convey my views
regarding the direction in which our renewal is heading, because
I do not want to see it adopt the attitude of "business as
usual". This was the way the New Order expanded their authority
to the utmost, in which nobody could challenge them until the
monetary crisis of 1997.

We voted for you and you were entrusted by us to reform and/or
renew our government. What does renewal mean? Renewal means to
reinstate our values and beliefs. The founding fathers proclaimed
Indonesia's "freedom, equality, fraternity and mutual agreement
as prioritized in God's guiding principles of Pancasila for those
in charge of our nation to strive themselves in good faith and
honesty, to achieve the well-being and social justice in our
nation on earth".

Freedom in Indonesian terms means absence from subjugation by
others. Each freedom requires a linkage of responsibility toward
others. The rights of equal opportunity mean a moral duty of each
individual to share the opportunity as the merits permit. The
fraternity gotong royong means a common effort for the benefit of
society. Finally, mutual agreement on the affairs of men in every
forum should lead to civility in the conduct of self-governance.
That is the essence of our values and beliefs.

But as history has taught us, the essence of freedom requires
that power be limited and never concentrated on one man, one
group or on one institution. The denial of that finality is the
key to our capacity to reform. Your renewal should proceed with
the rule of law. The separation of power and innumerable checks
and balances make it almost impossible for any individual or
group to have power in one place. Once we accept the concept of
renewal, we cannot depend on the rule of men alone. The rule of
law should help men in the conduct of self-governance.

We created our nation's republic to serve our shared purpose.
We cannot blame foreigners for our own mistakes and our own
decay. Those of us who understood what we should have done to
prevent the self-destruction were ostracized in the past. On the
other hand, those who supported the power, especially those
intellectuals, were living a good life to the extent of enjoying
for several, if not for "seven generations".

Now we know as the learned intellectual used to say of the
good old days as "really stuffy, pretentious without being
literate, erudite without understanding, pedantic without being
critical". As we enter the 21st century, I hope we will not see
the repetition of this episode.

MAHFUDI NOTONEGORO

East Stroudsburg, PA

USA