Liberty often abused by RI powerholders

Liberty often abused by RI powerholders

By Ignas Kleden

This is the first of two articles on liberty in Indonesia
since the colonial yoke was toppled in 1945.

JAKARTA (JP): Liberty seems to have its own history in
Indonesia. When it was initially introduced in the early 1920s
through the political writings of Sukarno, the word sounded and
was accepted as a mere neologism in the then Malay language.

That was the case because in many parts of the Netherlands
Indies (the name of the Indonesian territories during the
colonial era), and particularly among the indigenous nobility who
served as agents of indirect rule, there was a general feeling
that colonial rule was not that bad.

During the difficult weeks and months after the attainment of
Indonesia's independence in 1945, many people were still asking:
"When will we be colonized again?" No wonder, the idea that the
people in the Netherlands Indies should be independent of their
colonial masters appeared strange, not only to most of the people
in the then colony but also to the colonial masters.

The genius of Sukarno, Indonesia's first president, and his
contemporaries was that they were able to persuade most people
that freedom from colonial bondage was necessary and legitimate.

It had nothing to do with the question of whether the white
men and women were good or bad. These people might have been very
nice, helpful and friendly as well. But the colonial system was
not justified, simply because the exploitation of one nation by
another nation, a race by another race and human beings by other
human beings contradicted point-blank the basic human rights of
self-determination.

Needless to say, the nationalist movement was supported by
many unprecedented developments in international politics at that
time which helped make the colonized people confident of their
cause. Sukarno was, of course, one of the leading lights among
those who succeeded in marshaling a concerted effort in the
struggle for national independence as a political realization of
the idea of liberty. This was done particularly by inculcating
nationalist fervor and giving it revolutionary flavor.

In the course of time, Sukarno's revolution ended up
victimizing its own children. This happened after he declared the
termination of parliamentary democracy and put into force a
presidential system.

"Liberal" democracy was superseded by the so-called Guided
Democracy, which unfortunately treated those who were still
fascinated by the idea of liberty as opposing the revolution.

At that moment, revolution and democracy went their own ways
and when they met occasionally, they stood in contradiction to
each other. Sjahrir was sent to jail and Mohammad Hatta finally
withdrew from the office of Vice President, though both were
definitely comrades in arms for Sukarno during the struggle
against the Dutch administration and Japanese occupation.

The end of the Old Order government, ironically, was
celebrated as the moment of regaining the liberty which fell
victim to the authoritarian governance of Sukarno after 1959.

Soeharto came to power in 1967 as a new symbol for liberty
from political hanky-panky, moral decadence and economic
collapse. The rule of law, clean and effective governance, and
economic growth were the flags Soeharto used to wave to attract
political support from the people, the military and the students.
However, politics was not only the art of the possible, but also
the manipulation of the possible.

After 1974, many ideas which had brought all social forces
together became noticeably reactionary. Economic growth and the
sustainability of national development were made a pretext under
which to justify every action of the government to truncate
liberty and its expression.

Likewise, the rule of law became an effective means in the
hands of the president to label every social criticism and
democratic expressions as unconstitutional (who the hell was
fully entitled to interpret the articles of the Constitution?).
At the same time, very obvious practices of corruption were never
condemned as unconstitutional.

Soeharto's New Order government was initially fairly
effective, committed and relatively clean. A big change, however,
took place after the oil boom period when the government was so
confident of its ability to finance every development project
with the money from its own pocket.

After all, Indonesia was like a boat floating in an ocean of
oil. As the revenue from petrorupiah started to mount, the
sobriety of political equanimity evaporated, and corruption
started its life at the heart of the center of power.

Money corruption developed into mental corruption and took the
form of both cronyism among the business circle, nepotism among
political elite and collusion as a link between both.

However, one thing was forgotten. Corruption and its
derivatives did not corrupt only the mental resilience of
people, especially those within the bureaucracy, but also the
self-sustainability of the political system.

In such a condition, the fundamentals of the country's
political system and economy were undermined from within. No
wonder this system did not have any capability to withstand the
hit of the monetary crisis. The tower of economic growth turned
out to be a tower of Babel, where political language was always
misunderstood by market sentiment.

The present discussion is revolving around whether or not
Soeharto and his family really have huge sums of money in foreign
banks, supposedly enough to help overcome the present economic
crisis.

Soeharto, in a recent interview, said he had nothing and would
happily rely for the rest of his life on his official pension.

Probosutedjo, the younger half-brother of Soeharto, keeps
trying to persuade people that the rumors of the unimaginable
riches of the Cendana (Soeharto) Family were overly exaggerated
and there was no evidence of extreme wealth with legal validity.

Now that tangible data is still under the surface, lawyers are
being challenged to prepare legal arguments.

The writer is a sociologist based in Jakarta.

Window: The end of the Old Order government, ironically, was
celebrated as the moment of regaining the liberty which fell
victim to the authoritarian governance of Sukarno after 1959.