Political parties a conflict resolution training ground?

Political parties a conflict resolution training ground?

Harry Bhaskara, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Democracy in the country has reached the awkward stage of
adolescence. Power transfers at the highest level were successful
last October, but not so at political party level this year. For
free elections to be held, political parties must be willing and
able, but a spate of party congresses in recent weeks have shown
that democracy is in short supply.

Political parties have been saddled with internal disputes. A
rival leadership group had threatened to set up a new party to
challenge Megawati Soekarnoputri before she was reelected in
March at the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle's (PDI-P)
congress in Bali.

A splinter group of National Awakening Party (PKB) leaders is
seeking legal means to declare the recent PKB congress invalid.
They are also planning to set up a rival party.

The reelection of Megawati is intriguing since she failed to
bring the party to victory in the 2004 election. In fact, the
congress in Bali became a rubber stamp for Megawati's
reelection.

Megawati, undoubtedly is indebted to her late father, Sukarno
-- the charismatic founding father of the nation -- for her
reelection. A good many of her supporters were her father's
admirers. The general public, however, rejected her leadership by
voting last year for Army Gen.(ret) Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.

Following Megawati's reelection, Abdurrahman "Gus Dur" Wahid
was reelected as chief patron of the National Awakening Party
(PKB) in its congress in mid-April in Semarang.

The maverick Gus Dur is the grandson of the founder of
Nahdlatul Ulama, the world's largest Muslim organization, which
he led for 15 years. As a PKB founder, Gus Dur retains a central
position in the party, which was founded in 1999. He was also
instrumental in his nephew, Muhaimin Iskandar -- who is also
House of Representatives deputy speaker -- securing the party's
top post. The election was marred by a fight that left two people
injured.

Most political parties are imperfect in the preparation of
their leaders, from the bottom up.

To some extent, this is also true of the National Mandate
Party (PAN), which convened its congress in Semarang prior to the
PKB's. Here, the charismatic leader is Amien Rais, who catapulted
little-known businessman Soetrisno Bachir into the position of
party chief.

A party leader who owes his leadership to a charismatic leader
will likely be guided by the latter.

For the 32 years of Soeharto's rule, political party leaders
were largely determined by the strong man. Now that Soeharto is
no longer in power, leaders with connections, or charisma, have
taken his place. Conspicuously absent is a leader who comes from
the bottom. The public, ever so hopeful of a healthy democracy
after Soeharto's fall in 1998, must cling to that hope, for the
time being.

Leadership is but one of a string of handicaps in the recent
party congresses. A large dash of nepotism was thrown in as well.
Megawati installed her younger brother, Guruh, as a board member
and Gus Dur fought for his nephew, Muhaimin, to be chosen as
party leader and his daughter, Zanuba "Yenny" Arifah Chafsoh
Rahman, to sit on the party's executive board.

In the PDI-P congress in Bali, sessions deliberating
Megawati's performance were cut short. In the case of PAN,
leadership contender Hatta Radjasa, who is also minister of
transportation, withdrew from the race following talks with
Amien. Although there was no brawls in this congress, things
could have been done in a more transparent way.

Money politics and rewards for favors have been the substance
of strong rumors from each congress. Difficult as they are to
prove, public interests are not as high up on the agenda as one
would hope.

The choice of a businessperson as party leader could also be
perceived as a handicap. Soetrisno, like Jusuf Kalla -- the vice
president who was elected as Golkar leader in December 2004 -- is
a businessmen. The fact that businesspeople are selected as the
heads of political parties underlines the glaringly obvious:
Money is a prerequisite for power.

Political parties make excellent training ground for the
resolution of differences. Thus, a rift within a political party
is a sure sign that members' training is not going so well. If
this is so, how do politicians imagine they can solve problems at
national level?

While reports on congresses unveil a certain level of
immaturity on the part of our politicians, they are not entirely
to blame. They are nothing but the victims of past political
practices, when political parties were the mere tools of those in
power.

Hard work awaits the members -- particularly the reformists --
of those parties, to navigate the difficult terrain toward a
durable democracy.

Otherwise, their erstwhile narrow political outlooks will
translate into a faltering political system at a national level.

The author is a staff writer with The Jakarta Post.