PPP accepts its second fiddle role

By Dwi Atmanta

JAKARTA (JP): As the general election draws near, the United Development Party (PPP) has resigned itself to doing no more than playing second fiddle to Golkar, despite its claim of voicing the aspirations of the country's Moslems.

Indonesia, the world's largest Moslem country, has held six general elections since its independence in 1945, but none have been won by a Moslem party.

Moslems remember fondly the heyday of Nahdlatul Ulama (NU). As a political party, the rural-based NU emerged as a strong contender to the government parties in the first two elections, in 1955 and 1971.

Although four Moslem parties joined forces in 1973 and merged to form PPP as a consequence of the government's decision to trim the number of political parties, the government-supported political group Golkar has never had any trouble in winning the last five elections.

PPP Secretary-General Tosari Wijaya said yesterday that even if the party wished to maintain its traditional reliance on ulemas and Moslems in villages in the May 29 poll, he was doubtful the party could reverse its losing streak.

"Our firm grip in many rural areas remains, but it will mean nothing if there is no guarantee of a just and honest election," Tosari asserted.

"Unlike urban dwelers, villagers do not like confrontation. They tend to be submissive once they come before the authorities," he said.

The PPP will compete against Golkar and the Indonesian Democratic Party in the upcoming election for 425 seats in the House of Representatives.

Tosari said the last four elections showed a more balanced vote distribution between Golkar and the PPP in towns and big cities in Java. But while the PPP could challenge Golkar's supremacy in urban areas, the dominant political group swept the vote in most villages.

"The wide gap between the two parties raised many eyebrows over whether the elections were free from cheating," Tosari said.

The PPP's vote in the last four elections has declined. It won 99 seats in the House of Representatives in 1977, lost five seats in the next election five years later, took just 61 seats in 1987 and gained one in 1992 to take 62 seats.

"Until we succeed in promoting a nationwide political education program, the PPP will never emerge the winner," Tosari said.

Democratization

Democratization will be the highlight of the PPP's election campaign, scheduled from April 27 to May 23, according to Tosari.

"When it comes to democratic practices, we have been left behind by other countries. We are far from establishing truly democratic legal and law enforcement systems," Tosari said.

Other themes will include the improvement of political ethics and the eradication of the socioeconomic disparity.

Tosari criticized Golkar's perpetual desire for an overwhelming majority, saying it would discourage democratization and encourage the dominant political grouping to ignore the existing democratic process.

Golkar has been accused of abusing government facilities to win each of the last five elections. The grouping has also come under fire for compelling the country's six million civil servants to pledge their allegiance to it.

Tosari is taking a low profile when it comes to predicting the party's fortunes in the upcoming election.

"We will consider we are the winner if the election runs fairly and honestly. We prefer a moral victory to a physical one, only because we realize we will have to leave it to our grandchildren to enjoy a democratic culture," he said.

The PPP leadership has set its sights on repeating its 1982 achievement, when it secured 94 House seats.

"We always think in a practical way, although we are indeed struggling to achieve our ideals in every election," Tosari said.

The decision not to set an ambitious target will also apply to the campaign as the PPP leadership will let certain branches abstain from holding rallies or campaigning at all if they can't afford to.

"The press have mistakenly called it a boycott. We are going to fight it out, but we understand that some of our branches will fail to comply the restrictive election rules," Tosari said.

Seven district branches in Central Java have called on the leadership to ignore the campaign rules recently. PPP Chairman Ismail Hasan Metareum said over the weekend the party would urge the government to revise the rules.

Tosari, who has been named coordinating manager of the party's "election winning efforts" department along with the PPP's deputy chairman Yusuf Syakir, said the party's preparations were underway despite the controversy over the campaign rules.

The preparations are expected to finish at the end of this month. The party's central board has set the election budget at Rp 4 billion (US$1.7 million).

The government has yet to disburse financial grants to the poll contestants. For the 1992 election each party received Rp 250 million in presidential aid.

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