Open voting system

Open voting system

From Media Indonesia

The conflict between President Abdurrahman Wahid and the House
of Representatives has been going on for quite a while and is
becoming more alarming. In the New Order era, political power was
in the hands of a dictatorial and authoritarian president, but
today our House is dictatorial and oligarchic. Daily, a handful
of legislators demonstrate their enmity toward the President by
countering his statements, thereby worsening the political
tension.

These legislators now have the upper hand as the People's
Consultative Assembly is to convene a special session on Aug. 1,
2001. The special session's sole agenda is hearing the
President's accountability report.

These legislators know that if the accountability report is
rejected, the President will be impeached and unseated. To make
their grand plan come true, they will demand for an open voting
system, just like what they did when they passed two censure
motions against the President.

In the New Order era, decision making was always based on the
principle of "deliberation and consensus", which was fraught with
manipulation. At present the open voting system is also fraught
with manipulation. The political scene today is dominated by
party and faction leaders who are actual the decisionmakers. So,
a legislator voicing a different opinion will be pressured by
other members of his faction.

What's worse, the mass media have portrayed the party and
faction leaders as celebrities in a legislative oligarchy,
resulting in the marginalizing of the participation of other
legislators.

So if the upcoming special session of the Assembly is to serve
as a means to resolve the political crisis, conscience must be
used and public opinion building in the interest of a particular
party must be avoided.

In this respect, the system of closed voting, which was used
when President Abdurrahman was elected president in the general
session of the Assembly in 1999, should be used to allow every
legislator to vote according to his conscience and decide whether
the President should be brought down.

SULISTIYANI

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