Living with Sutiyoso

If nothing else, it attests to the wisdom of the anti-Sutiyoso camp that they chose to stay away from the City Council building on Monday during the inauguration of the former Jakarta military commander as Jakarta's governor for the coming five years.

By that act they may have disappointed those who had hoped to see thousands of protesters gather to voice the widespread dissatisfaction with Sutiyoso's reelection to a second term. At the same time, however, they managed to prevent what had looked like an unavoidable -- and unproductive -- violent confrontation with security personnel and Sutiyoso supporters.

The inauguration on Monday of the widely unpopular Sutiyoso as governor of Jakarta marked the culmination of a months-long process of intensive politicking within the Jakarta City Council; a process rife with allegations of bribery and manipulation.

Sutiyoso's reelection also came despite the intense pressure that was put on the legislature to reject him because of his poor record in managing the city, and for his alleged role as military commander of Jakarta in July 1996 in the attack on the Indonesian Democratic Party headquarters in Central Jakarta and in suppressing the rioting that came in its wake.

For all those reasons, Sutiyoso is not the best person to lead Jakarta in the eyes of many. Nevertheless, the fact remains that he has been reelected and installed as governor of Jakarta for a second term in office -- a reality that Jakarta's citizenry will have to accept whether or not they like it.

That being the case, the only thing Jakartans can do now is look ahead to the future and see what can be done to make certain their newly installed governor performs his duties to the benefit of the people, and that he does not repeat the mistakes he has made in the past.

That, of course, would be much easier for Sutiyoso's critics -- especially those non-governmental organizations (NGOs), experts and members of the public who have disparaged Sutiyoso's performance in the past -- had the governor used the occasion of his inauguration to give the public a brief outline of his vision for Jakarta in the coming five years, in the way that presidents do upon their inauguration. Sutiyoso himself, in remarks he made to the media before and after his inauguration, appealed to the public to let bygones be bygones and to work with him to improve conditions in Jakarta.

While it may not be so easy for some people to forgive and forget, certainly Jakartans can do much by exercising control over how the city administration -- and the City Council -- carries out its duties in making life better for the populace, including improving the distribution of wealth and opportunity among the Jakarta's more than 10 million residents, the city's urban poor in particular.

Certainly there will be no shortage of obstacles for Governor Sutiyoso to overcome during the coming five years. The problem of flooding remains one of the major headaches for both the city administration and the citizenry. Governor Sutiyoso must be seen to be making good on his promise to do something about this yearly recurring and worsening scourge. Traffic congestion is another problem Sutiyoso will have to confront, and increasingly frequent and brutal street crime must be reduced to a minimum and if possible eliminated, as to rampant corruption in the administration. To confront all these problems and many more, the governor will need the support and cooperation of the entire community -- not an easy task given the criticism that has been hurled at him in the past.

So much for what has been. As for the future, it is a rare person who does not realize that most of the problems with past gubernatorial elections -- including vote manipulation and "money politics" -- stem from the fact that it is the political parties, rather than the populace that nominate and elect the candidates. Political parties have their own programs and interests to fulfill.

Therefore, if gubernatorial elections are to satisfy the wishes of the populace at large, our provincial governors must be elected directly by the public. This is the message that can be drawn from the Sutiyoso experience this week, and this is the goal toward which Indonesians must work.