Parties' economic programs lacking detail: Economists

Dadan Wijaksana, The Jakarta post, Jakarta

While most political parties are united in condemning the government for failing to set out an economic program that can get the nation out of crisis, most of them have failed to offer any alternative.

Respected economists Faisal Basri and Chatib Basri agreed that the economic platforms laid out by most of the 24 parties contesting the elections were only good on paper, but lack details on how to achieve the goals.

"It's sad to see that amid consensus that our economy is in trouble, most parties, if not all, have so far failed to come up with a sound and applicable economic program," Faisal said.

Chatib explained that this may be due to the fact that the country was still in early stages of democracy, where program- oriented campaigning is still new and parties have yet to realize the importance of a sound economic platform in luring followers.

"They don't find economic programs saleable," Chatib said.

On Saturday, parties will enter the second week of the campaign period which will end on April 1.

In the first week of the campaigns, only a small number of parties offered a "fairly workable" economic agenda. They include the New Indonesia Alliance Party (PPIB), National Mandate Party (PAN) and the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS).

PAN has shown its seriousness in economic matters by placing economists, including top banking analyst Dradjad Wibowo, on its list of legislative candidates.

Meanwhile, a PKS campaigner, who in the past week kept criticizing the current government's economic program, repeatedly stressed the need to improve the country's industrial competitiveness and to maintain sustainable macroeconomic stability.

PAN and PKS promised to streamline the bureaucracy, provide various facilities for businesses, including tax incentives, and provide better legal certainty and security. These are all areas in which the current government has failed to perform.

PPIB, chaired by noted economist Sjahrir, has also shown a deep interest in economic issues.

Before establishing the party last year, Sjahrir led a prominent economic think tank, PIB, which in 2001, formulated a nine-chapter draft on economic recovery which was then proposed to the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) to become a decree. The MPR rejected the proposal, but PPIB now uses the proposal as its economic platform.

The proposal outlines a list of actions to remedy problems in all sectors of the economy and state institutions. The actions include those aimed at improving the business and investment climate and tackling domestic and foreign debts. These will boost investment, generate higher growth and ease unemployment.