Pancasila principles neglected
JAKARTA (JP): Indonesia has not fully implemented Pancasila, 50 years after the state ideology was formulated, former home affairs minister Gen. (ret.) Rudini said on Saturday.
This is despite elaborate attempts to understand and conceptualize the ideology, Rudini told a seminar organized by a youth organization to mark the "birth" of Pancasila.
"Our nation can be really strong if we truly live up to, and implement, Pancasila. But 50 years since it was formulated, we can sense that the principles contained therein have not been fully observed," said Rudini, who now heads the Institute for Strategic Studies of Indonesia, an independent think tank.
Rudini was one of several speakers who addressed the one-day seminar. The event was organized by Indonesia Muda, a youth study group on nation building issues, at Gedung Joang 45. Other speakers included elderly statesmen Roeslan Abdulgani and Solichin G.P. and economist Sri Edi Swasono.
In the 1950s and 1960s, June 1 was nationally commemorated as the anniversary of Pancasila. It was widely accepted at the time that Sukarno, then a young revolutionary leader, introduced the ideology in a public speech on June 1, 1945.
However, in the 1970s, the tradition to mark the anniversary ceased after some historians disputed that the ideology was founded by Sukarno. They said Pancasila was the product of a group of scholars before Sukarno incorporated it in his speech.
The discussion on Saturday, however, stayed away from the controversy about the origins of Pancasila.
Rudini said Indonesia has not fully lived up to all the five principles contained in Pancasila: belief in one God, humanitarianism, national unity, democracy through consensus, and social justice.
He pointed out that the first principle does not only refer to people's rights to practice religion in accordance with their faith, it also includes religious teachings and values.
Such values, he argued, appear to have been eroded. Many people, including the elite members of society, "shamelessly" conduct acts in denial of the Supreme Being, he said.
Collusion, corruption, greed, injustices and other deplorable acts have become rampant at a time when the country is proclaiming to become more religious, he said.
On the second principle, Rudini said Indonesia may become more affluent, but it is culturally "poor" because of the many injustices still found in society.
Indonesia's failure to involve all its citizens in the national development process is undermining national unity, the third principle in Pancasila, Rudini said. "The incidents in East Timor, Timika in Irian Jaya and many others are a reflection of this (failure)," he said.
On democracy, Rudini said there is a growing intolerance among people to differences of opinion. These differences are not settled through consensus as mandated under Pancasila, he added.
On the principle of social justice for all people of Indonesia, he said the country appears to be moving away from that goal. "More and more people are finding it difficult to obtain justice in this country," he said.
The seminar was attended by about 200 people, including well- known critics of the government and human rights activists and students. Among the crowd were former Jakarta governor Ali Sadikin, Soepeni of the New Indonesian Nationalist Party, Harjono Tjitrosoebono of the Indonesian Legal Aid Foundation, former freedom fighter S.K. Trimurti and several retired generals. (16)