Neighboring countries concerned over developments in Indonesia
Neighboring countries concerned over developments in Indonesia
Hanys Salmi, Kuala Lumpur
The current social-political developments in our giant
neighbor Indonesia have become the focus of attention in the
Southeast Asian region. There are at least three areas of concern
on which strategic thinkers and policy makers are training their
political telescopes -- Indonesia's July 5 presidential election,
the possible spill-over of its social and economic problems, and
the country's dubious stance on the international fight against
terrorism.
On the issue of the Indonesian presidential election, the main
worry is about the possibility of a military dictatorship
emerging and masquerading as a democracy. Such concern is not
without logical foundations. The fact is, although millions of
Indonesians are struggling to create civilian supremacy in their
fledgling democracy, the country's political parties have
intentionally nominated three retired generals to contest the
election -- former Military (TNI) commander Wiranto, former chief
of the TNI's territorial staff (Kaster) Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono,
who used to oversee nine regional military commands (Kodam), and
former commander of the Sulawesi military region Agum Gumelar.
Though the three have served in Cabinet in civilian capacities
their former subordinates are still on active duty in the
military. These connections could allow any of them to revive the
dirty politics of the country's former tyrant Soeharto.
However, Wiranto and Yudhoyono have tried to convince the
Southeast Asian region of their honest intentions in promoting
democracy in Indonesia. Both were invited separately to Singapore
recently to address policy makers and business strategists who
are now wondering whether they will match their words with deeds
if they are elected.
At the center of their speeches was an apparent determination
to promote the rule of law, democracy and human rights while
pulling the country out of its socio-economic crisis. In a five
year-term of office, by any logical calculation, none of them
would be able to solve all the country's problems, even with
magic spells. Indonesia's domestic problems are so huge that
perhaps the country needs 20 years to put its house in order and
turn itself into a stabilizing influence in the region.
The next president's first priority must be improving national
stability and securing territorial integrity against the
implementation of regional autonomy that, if not well-checked,
could eventually become a source of disintegration.
In order to balance autonomy with the need to keep the nation
intact, there are very big temptations for the next Indonesian
president to pursue a military approach, simply because the
archipelago with more than 17,000 islands inhabited by over 220
million people from various religious and ethnic backgrounds
cannot be easily held intact with a soft civilian approach.
Regional analysts doubt that the Indonesian reform movement
will make much progress in the next five years. The most likely
outcome is that the current pace of change will be maintained,
but after some time Indonesians may well become cynical or bored
with reform and concentrate on their personal and familial
economic wellbeing. This could endanger the future of the
nation's democracy and could encourage the return of military
politics, especially if the civilian forces remain split as they
are today.
Another focus of attention is on Indonesia's social and
economic maladies. This is a noisy country where political
leaders talk too much and act too little. Each one of them can
spend hours talking about economic recovery to satisfy their
audiences, and do only that. When the monetary crisis hit the
region in July 1997 and grew worse the next year, virtually all
the members of ASEAN were seriously affected. And Indonesia is
the only ASEAN member still unable to pull itself away from the
impact of the crisis.
One of the reasons for this is its political reluctance to
strengthen the legal system, which makes it hard for honest
government leaders to take stern measures against well-connected
debtors and "law-proof" corrupters.
Up to 1.2 million of the workforce have now been employed in
Malaysia and almost twice the number are employed in Arab and
other Asian countries. But the major bulk of the disgruntled
jobless people are inside Indonesia doing whatever they can to
make ends meet. This is a dangerous political time bomb that may
explode in the years ahead if no serious action is taken to
defuse it. Of the 150 million eligible voters, 40 million are
jobless while the country's official statistics show that 37
million people are living in abject poverty.
For countries like Malaysia and Singapore, the main worry is
if this time bomb should explode and spill over in the form of an
uncontrolled outflow of illegal workers and other types of social
refugees in which case the region's stability could be seriously
affected. One way to prevent this from happening is perhaps for
the Malaysian and Singaporean governments to pay more attention
to Indonesia's domestic issues and increase bilateral assistance
for Indonesia's labor-intensive sectors.
The third topic of interest among regional strategic thinkers
and policy makers is Indonesia's bizarre stance on the
international fight against terrorism. The country is a good
place for extremists, fundamentalists and perhaps even terrorists
to take sanctuary and partake in activities that elsewhere would
be considered subversive.
Since May 1998 when the country began its ambitious reform
process, this particular area has been the most difficult to deal
with. Government leaders simply have no concept about how to
handle such troublemakers, although the culprits represent only a
tiny portion of society and their claims of faith are not
supported by their countrymen of the same religion. This
situation is a puzzle to government leaders, business people and
analysts in many countries.
Considering all these developments, analysts are wondering if
Indonesia will remain stable in the years ahead or whether it
would reverse backwards and become a source of regional
instability. The future depends of the actions of the political
leaders.
The writer is a researcher on Indonesian issues for a Kuala
Lumpur-based company. He can be reached at
hanyssalmi@malaysia.com