Money politics: Seeking help of the lords of the purse

B. Herry-Priyono, Researcher, Alumnus, London School of Economics

On Friday Sept. 13, when Mahfudz Djailani admitted that he had paid Rp 200 million to 40 councillors as down payment of a total of Rp 2 billion if they elected him to the post of Jakarta Governor, people must have been angered and burst into laughter simultaneously.

Angered, as politics had become so low. And they would have laughed because the news revealed the obvious anyway.

On Monday, Sept. 16, when Mahfudz retracted his admission and decided not to reveal the names of the 40 councillors as he had threatened to, people must have laughed even harder. Probably not because the information was untrue, but because the legal implications of revealing the names seems to have scared him. As we know, "law" is not synonymous with "truth".

With or without anger cum laughter, money politics seems to be a misnomer. There has never been politics without money as much as there is no money without politics. Money and politics are like Siamese twins that can almost not be separated with surgery. Indeed, no form of politics could deal forever with the insidious power of wealth -- particularly portable and negotiable wealth.

Imagine the following hypothetical scenario. You are the president of a country called Indonesia, and, for whatever reasons, you want to secure your seat in the 2004 general elections. What would you need? -- To secure the machine of financial resources. Where are such financial machines located? There are at least three cities you must control: Jakarta, Surabaya and Medan. Not because they represent Indonesia, but because in these cities are located the lords of the purse.

Who are they? Business tycoons, big businesses and other financial oligarchs. So, the stage is set for either comedy or tragedy. You may wish to believe that the interests of administrative power (your presidency and the governorship of Jakarta) could be insulated from the influence of financial power (tycoons, big businesses and other lords of the business). Similarly, you may wish the financial power could be insulated from administrative power.

Machiavelli would have risen from his grave and rushed to say that such insulation is wishful thinking. What works is what is done. The normative is of course not so, but norm is a rhetorical bubble that is there to work as a facade. The more vacuous and merrier the rhetorical bubble, the better.

Then, suppose that some of your close friends were business tycoons. They may look indifferent toward the battle for the Jakarta gubernatorial race. Their "indifference" is quite deceptive. This apparent indifference simply comes from the fact that they, unless they run as formal candidates, are officially not part of the state apparatus or would-be state apparatus.

This, however, does not conceal the fact that they have every stake in the gubernatorial race. If there is no business outside the definition of administrative power (and vice versa), there is also no business that is disinterested in the struggle for administrative power.

It is here that a "parasitical symbiosis" is forged. You, as president of Indonesia, have every interest to have a Jakarta governor as your lieutenant who will secure the votes for your 2004 presidential race.

But, above all, you and the would-be governor have every interest to secure financial resources, either for your personal pocket, your own business, or for funding your 2004 presidential ambition. On the part of your friends (some business magnates), they have every interest to have a president and a Jakarta governor who supports their businesses, either in the more general sense as a pro-business climate, or as a personal connection.

They will not support a president or a Jakarta governor who takes the side of the urban poor vis-a-vis their industrial or financial interests. Some of them would not even hesitate to raise thousands of mercenaries to back their ambitions with necessary violence.

Suppose I decided to run as candidate in the Jakarta gubernatorial race. Suppose also that I have a good platform and program, am considered qualified -- professionally, managerially, intellectually -- and I have broad support from most Jakartans. What do I lack? First, money. Second, financial support from many business oligarchs. Third, control over the Jakarta City Council that does not necessarily represent the will of the Jakarta populace.

One may think that the members of the City Council were angels with constant eyes on the agonies of ordinary Jakartans, who would thus vote for the most qualified candidate to deal with the problems of a city in agony. That is of course a farce. Once we know that the council is also made up of people who, on the whole, are guided by considerations of self-interest, the mystery is solved.

Then the question shifts as to whether I could make the highest bid. Such a bid of course does not take place overtly, for secrecy is the mother of collusion. Law is good, but it is little more than rhetorical bubble in this politico-economic morass.

I would also have to make the highest bid to the president who has every stake to control Jakarta, Medan and Surabaya. In total, the amount may reach billions or trillions of rupiah, either fixed or negotiated. If I want to be a ruler in Surabaya, perhaps I need to spend Rp 100 billion. I would guess in Jakarta the bid reaches hundreds of billion or some trillions. Alas, I was not elected, for if I were, I would chase back what I have invested on.

So the stage is set for the game of administrative autocrats and financial oligarchs. In the meantime, the pangs of brutish survival of the ordinary Jakartans rumble on, as if nothing has happened. Of course the tragedy enters into the collective subconscious of the masses. No wonder once in a while we find the angry mobs revolting.