More autonomy 'key to keeping nation united'

More autonomy 'key to keeping nation united'

JAKARTA (JP): Scholars provided on Tuesday different
explanations about what constitutes the threat of national
disintegration, but agreed that more autonomy for regions would
be among the best measures to keep the nation unified.

Moslem scholar Nurcholish Madjid said that what some analysts
considered recent signs of disintegration were actually the
venting of people's participation in social and political life.

"The way to deal with the 'explosive' participation is to
accommodate it. Look at Aceh... or Irian Jaya," he said at a
gathering of student activists from 44 universities across the
country. "Their natural resources have been exploited 'dry', then
people suggested (that Indonesia be changed from a unitary state)
into a federal state."

"It's not a problem of a unitary or federal state. The most
important thing is to give (the provinces) greater autonomy."

He said Indonesia was designed at its founding in 1945 to
become a modern nation state which was open and egalitarian.

"This country lacks nation-building values," he said.

"The late president Sukarno had a deep sense of nation
building, but he derived it from books, so became a romantic. As
a result, we had to go through 20 years of trial and error before
we found the right model of a modern state."

He believed former president Soeharto did not possess the same
trait but was extremely intelligent. However, his lack of the
sense of nation building contributed to his many blind spots and
the blunders he made, including letting his children interfere in
his job. "This would not have happened if he had a strong sense
of nation building...," Nurcholish said.

One way to ward off the danger of disintegration, he said,
would be to give provinces more opportunities to develop.

Minister of Justice Muladi, who was also a professor in law,
rejected calls that the country change from a unitary to federal
state. Much homework needed to be done for the country to improve
its "unity", he acknowledged.

Indonesia has so far failed to eliminate primordialism, there
is the tendency to view the Constitution as almost sacred and
above change and the government deals with problems in regions in
a fragmented manner, Muladi said.

He also identified centralization of power and violations of
human rights as other problems.

"We have failed, for instance, in integration which is
horizontal in nature. Many people still see their brethren from
outside of (the more developed) Java as stupid."

President B.J. Habibie's economic advisor Frans Seda also said
that a unitary state was the best format for the country in
facing the impact of globalization.

"Even the European countries want to unite themselves. Why
would we go and break ourselves up?"

The student gathering, opened by Minister of Education Juwono
Sudarsono, is scheduled to end on Wednesday. Student participants
had the opportunity to meet not only their seniors, but also
government officials they have criticized in various
demonstrations. They met with Armed Forces Commander Gen. Wiranto
and questioned him about the Armed Forces (ABRI) dual-function
doctrine, which endorses its roles in both security and political
affairs. (edt)