Local elections -- the storm before the calm

Local elections -- the storm before the calm

Meidyatama Suryodiningrat, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The saying "the calm before the storm" does not apply to
Indonesian politics. In most instances it is the exact opposite:
a storm before the calm.

The election season of 2004 was one case where initial concern
and anxiety belied the eventual calm at the polls.

Now we are hearing much brouhaha over local administration
elections -- of regulations found wanting, a lack of preparation
and fears of chaos.

With some 170 local elections throughout the year, there is
bound to be pandemonium. Yes, there will be clashes, cases of
ballot fraud and vote-buying. Legal challenges will be abound
from sore losers and political opportunists trying to exploit
legal technicalities.

However for the most part, the storm will become isolated and
sporadic.

The very nature of local elections -- provincial, regency and
municipality levels -- means the debates remain local, which will
result in a disconnect between other areas. Hence the issues,
while interesting to watch, will not evolve into an agitating
nationwide affair.

The lack of "substance" in the elections also makes for a
quick-resolving affair at the grassroots level.

Despite a few campaigns exploiting religious slogans, local
elections will be ideologically free. Most of the candidates do
not belong to ideologically rigid political parties since most
are secular in practice and running for crude realist objectives
-- power. Exceptions to watch are candidates from the Prosperous
Justice Party (PKS) who have shown a vein of conservatism
throughout its history.

Neither should we expect the local elections to pit major
policy alternatives, because there is little policy distinction
-- if there is even a presentable cohesive policy proposed --
between candidates. The spewed rhetoric will predictably range
between sentiments of anticorruption, welfare, regional authority
(anti-Jakarta) and ethnic chauvinism.

In the long run, the local elections should become a healthy
thing for democratic growth and the empowerment of local voices.
But given the evolutionary nature of political change, it will be
many years before an accountable and truly representative system
is in place.

In the medium term, the success of local elections will shape
ties between the center (Jakarta) and the regional
administrations.

For the short term, it is all about political elitism and its
impact on the 2009 general elections. It will be a laboratory, of
sorts, for national and presidential election strategies.

Three years of local elections presents the best way to
evaluate the true strength of political parties ahead of the
general election. It will either confirm or dismiss self-
indulgent predictions of a party's power base. The compiled data
will provide a basis for devising strategies to mobilize voters.

It also will provide a matrix of local issues, which can be
paired with national platforms in the 2009 elections. Major
parties in 2009 will be more sophisticated in their campaigns,
and more able to highlight local content, rather than
unattractive general national issues as they did in 2004.

The most important consequence of the local elections is the
financial one, and who controls what in which area. Command of a
local administration -- through the local council, regent and
business community -- ensures a degree of monopoly over its
natural resources.

The balance of power within most parties has shifted toward
party branches in regencies/provinces for the simple fact that
party central boards are now more dependent on "contributions"
from the branches.

Success in places like Riau, East Kalimantan and Papua, often
mean profit for the party's war chest. Money, in politics, often
goes hand-in-hand with electoral prowess. Central board
executives will be increasingly looking towards the regency
branches to subsidize their campaigns in 2009.

Sometimes it may be better in the medium term for a party to
be victorious in a small but rich regency or municipality, than
one that highly populated, yet limited in areas to financially
exploit.

Such is the "stormy" nature of Indonesian politics which, for
now, results in "calm" exploitation.