Political reality

Political reality

How much, or how little, popular support President Abdurrahman
Wahid still enjoys today is reflected in Saturday's resolution at
the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) when it overwhelmingly
voted to call him to account for his erratic leadership.

Eight of the 11 factions said they wanted to proceed with the
MPR Special Session to begin what is effectively an impeachment
process against the President. Two factions, including President
Abdurrahman's own Nation Awakening Party (PKB), boycotted the
session. The Indonesian Military/National Police faction,
professing neutrality on the issue, left the matter entirely up
to the MPR leadership.

When the matter was put to an open vote, 591 of the 600
Assembly members present, including all 38 military and police
representatives, voted to proceed with the constitutional process
to require the President to account for his leadership. That is
more than 98 percent. Even if we assumed that the other 100
Assembly members who were absent for one reason or another would
have voted in favor of the President, that would still leave us
with 84 percent who felt that the time had come for Abdurrahman
to present his accountability report at the Assembly session on
Monday.

Setting aside momentarily the debate about the
constitutionality of the Special Session or even of the Assembly
itself, the MPR remains the best available measure to gauge the
President's popularity. In Abdurrahman's case, the vote on
Saturday was a measure of his unpopularity.

The MPR is the product of the 1999 general election, which,
every one agrees, was the most democratic election held in this
country since independence. For Abdurrahman to denounce the MPR
as undemocratic now is tantamount to denouncing his own
presidency, for this is the same institution which put him there
in the first place, in spite of his party winning a paltry 11
percent of the vote in the general election.

The 700-strong MPR is also a better reflection than the House
of Representatives (DPR), which initiated the current Special
Session after serving two memorandums rebuking the President.
Besides the 500 House members, the MPR includes 135 elected
regional representatives and 65 representatives of societal
groups. Even the majority of these 200 additional representatives
voted to proceed with the Special Session.

The simple numbers emerging from the opening plenary meeting
of the MPR on Saturday speak volumes about how support and
goodwill for the President, which were overwhelming when he took
charge of the country in October 1999, have eroded since then.

These are the political realities which for some unexplained
reason have not sunk into Abdurrahman's head.

Granted, the President is right when he says that the other
political reality is he still has the constitutional powers
vested in him by the MPR. The President may just get away with
his plan to carry out his threat to impose a state of emergency,
a constitutional prerogative that comes with his job. He would
then be able to dissolve the MPR and arrest his political rivals.

He might just survive this MPR impeachment attempt, but he
would have to resort to increasingly authoritarian measures. He
would then be ruling by power but without the popular consent or
political legitimacy. Going by the experience of previous
presidents in this country, he would then have to become more and
more authoritarian in order to keep his power.

As for the constitutional debate, there is simply no end to
it. The 1945 Constitution is a vaguely worded document that is
open to far too much interpretation. Everyone can interpret it
according to his or her needs. Presidents Sukarno, Soeharto and
BJ Habibie each had his own interpretation. Abdurrahman is now
committing the same mistake of trying to impose his own
interpretation on the rest of us and justify retaining his power.

The ultimate measure to justify one's grip on power therefore
cannot be the 1945 Constitution, but the popular legitimacy one
has. On that count, based on Saturday's vote at the MPR,
Abdurrahman's presidency is no longer defensible.

President Abdurrahman will make a grave mistake if he thinks
that he can escape his destiny by deploying his fanatical
supporters on the streets to help keep in him power. This will
only make things more difficult for himself and his supporters,
including the Nahdulatul Ulama Muslim organization, later on. His
decision to expel Matori Abdul Djalil as PKB chairman, a moderate
figure in the party, will make reconciliation that much more
difficult once this power struggle is settled, one way or
another.

He should also bear in mind that two can play the same game,
and the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan),
the Golkar Party and the United Development Party (PPP) are all
far larger than Abdurrahman's PKB. They too could, if so
inclined, deploy their equally fanatical supporters on the
streets to counter his supporters.

Let's keep this ongoing power struggle limited to within the
nation's political elite. Whether elected or not, that is what
our politicians are there for, to settle the question of the
nation's leadership. Keep the masses, who are already mired in
problems of their own due to the prolonged financial crisis, out
of this messy political fight. But most of all, let the political
reality keep us all in check.