Megawati's political views

Megawati's political views

By Angus McIntyre

The following article by Angus McIntyre is based on presentations
at a conference of the Indonesia Council of the Asian Studies
Association of Australia at the University of Melbourne on July
11, and at the Mini-Update Conference of the Indonesian Institute
of Sciences on July 26 in Jakarta. The writer is senior lecturer
in politics at La Trobe University in Melbourne.

MELBOURNE (JP): We hear much speculation about Megawati's
behavior and politics. I would like to begin with her habit of
removing herself from the realm of political criticism and attack
by presenting an agreeable exterior to the world while
cultivating her inner strength. The evidence for this
characteristic comes from some remarks she made at the end of
October 1998 just after a Muslim politician, A.M. Saefuddin, had
claimed that she was a Hindu and that the next president of
Indonesia must be a Muslim male.

Last Oct. 29 Media Indonesia Online reported: "In front of
cadres, sympathizers and members of the Indonesian Democratic
Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan) yesterday, Megawati said that
whoever tries to attack and discredit her personally will be
faced with a smile because that is the best way in politics.
Beforehand she also expressed the hope that PDI members would not
react. "Why must we react. Just let it be. What is important is
that we continue to cultivate our inner beings, she stressed."

It is evident from this quote that Megawati has elevated this
way of dealing with adverse experiences into a principle and
urged it upon her followers. Indeed, she even urged something
like it upon the soldiers from the much criticized Special Forces
(Kopassus) whom she visited in late September 2000. She told
them, as quoted by this newspaper: "You should rebuild your self-
confidence and improve your professionalism as part of the effort
to improve the image of Kopassus. Self-confidence is not
inspired by other people, but it emanates from deep down in your
hearts.

This manner of behavior -- adapting to a difficult world while
working on one's inner resources -- which she has recommended
both to her followers and to members of Kopassus also appears to
underpin her vision for Indonesia. Writing for the Yomiuri Daily
of July 22, 1999, she said: "I always tell myself how lucky
Japan is to have had in its history the Meiji Restoration, which
allowed Japan to step into the modern era with its culture and
traditions intact. This is what makes me jealous and forces me
to question myself, deep within my own heart -- how to make
Indonesia a modern and developed society without losing the
spirit of its own very deep and unique cultural identity. To
achieve this is my dream."

This conservative vision of modernizing Indonesia while
preserving its highly valued, traditional culture is consistent
with what one might call Megawati's populist political outlook;
and nowhere was the latter more evident than in her opening
speech at the Sanur Congress of the Indonesian Democracy Party
(PDI) on Oct. 8, 1998.

There she spoke of her party not as a vehicle for the
representation of diverse groups and interests within the
community but as an instrument of her leadership of the
Indonesian People (always with a capital whom she regarded as a
single entity which speaks, or should speak, with only one voice,
and which willingly acknowledges her as its leader). In some of
her remarks it was possible to hear not only the strains of
populism but also an echo of her father's voice: "Listen to the
voice of the People, feel the heart beat of the People, give
voice to the aspiration of the People, and side with the People.
Because the voice of the People bears a message".

Most populist leaders have, of course, been males (her father
for one), and it is interesting to see her approach leadership
differently, replacing the pride and rage of her male predecessor
with a proclaimed maternal love. For example, she addressed
herself to the people of Aceh in the following terms in her
speech of July 29, 1999:

"Especially to my brothers and sisters in Aceh, I say, 'Be
patient'. Later when your Female Leader (Megawati uses the
Acehnese term 'Cut' here) is running this country, she will not
allow one drop of blood to be spilled of the people whose
achievements were so great in the struggle for Indonesian
independence. To you I will give my love, I will distribute the
proceeds from your Arun [Liquid Natural Gas Refinery] so that the
people can relish the beauty enjoyed by the Verandah of Mecca as
a consequence of it being developed with love and responsibility
by fellow Indonesian citizens".

But we also recognize in these remarks the authoritarianism
that tends to go hand in hand with populism in her emphasis on a
personal style of leadership in which her word is considered
sufficient guarantee of her steadfastness of purpose.

In light of this populism and authoritarianism, it is puzzling
to find that Megawati has also shown a strong commitment to the
rule of law. However, this phenomenon can be explained by her
recent history. If her conservative, Meiji-like vision for
Indonesia and her populism have roots in her past and her
personality (specifically in identification with her father),
then her commitment to the rule of law has its origins in the
rough treatment she received at the hands of second president
Soeharto in the mid-1990s.

Perhaps support for the rule of law had enjoyed a rudimentary
existence in her mind for many years but it only crystallized
into a firm and brave commitment in 1996 as a consequence of both
her ejection by Soeharto from the PDI leadership in May 1996 and
the subsequent, murderous attack on her party headquarters by
government thugs on July 27 of the same year. Ignoring the advice
of those who advised her to lie low, she immediately challenged
the legality of the Soeharto government's behavior, employing a
veritable army of lawyers in the process -- with her so-called
"Team for the Defense of Indonesian Democracy" -- and she never
missed an opportunity thereafter to affirm strongly her belief in
the rule of law, or negara hukum.

By 1999 it seems that Megawati had come to the view that the
negara hukum depends for its very existence on a separation of
powers, a view that she then tried to reconcile with her father's
hostility to Montesquieu's trias politika. She said in a speech
in Singapore in mid-March 1999: "Although Indonesia does not
adhere to Montesquieu's Trias Politika system, the PDI Perjuangan
still holds strongly to the position that there must be a clear
and transparent division between the legislative, judicial and
executive powers and that this must be applied to our future
political system."

The remark is somewhat contradictory but at least one may
observe the daughter trying to shed an unedifying aspect of her
father's legacy (Indonesia has rued the day first president
Sukarno made the chairman of the Supreme Court a member of his
cabinet).

We have the interesting phenomenon, then, of a leader,
conservative, populist and authoritarian by dint of her
background, being propelled in the direction of the rule of law
and the separation of powers by her experience as a victim of the
arbitrary actions of the Soeharto regime.

Thus it is that Megawati is particular about the rule of law
in Indonesia even as she thinks of the Indonesian people more in
terms of their collective uniqueness than their individual
diversity. In benign circumstances, it is likely that these
contrary elements in her political thinking will continue to
coexist. But the difficult circumstances in which the Republic
of Indonesia finds itself today, with its territorial integrity
threatened by separatist movements in Aceh and Papua, may tip the
balance in favor of her authoritarian side, in favor that is of
preserving the collective uniqueness of the Indonesian people by
force.

The first casualty of such a step would, of course, be the
rule of law or the negara hukum -- and, as there is no situation
of local conflict in Indonesia that cannot be made infinitely
worse by the introduction of its military, the second may very
well be the unitary state (negara kesatuan) itself.