President said to be key to political change
President said to be key to political change
YOGYAKARTA (JP): A political observer has taken a grim view of Indonesian politics, saying that any push for real changes is futile without the consent and cooperation of the presidential office.
Debates at the House of Representatives on how to usher in changes are useless, according to M. Mahfud, the director of the postgraduate program at the Indonesian Islamic University here.
"The solutions lie in how a person can convince the president to allow changes," he said in a discussion on law and power on Thursday.
Given this fact, both the House and the People's Consultative Assembly, which meets every five year to establish Broad Guidelines of State Policies, are mere rubber stamps to legitimize the president's rulings, he charged.
"They are effective only if they have lobbying power in the presidential office," he said.
"It's quite a bitter pill to swallow. But this is the reality of Indonesian politics," Mahfud said.
Mahfud cited several reasons for the president's great power.
The first is the president's position as the patron of Golkar, which holds the majority of seats in the House.
"If the president says A then Golkar will also say A," Mahfud said.
Second, the president is the commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces which, apart from playing its traditional defense role, is also a dominant player in the Indonesian political scene.
Third, Mahfud argues, is that the president has control over the state budget.
One way still available to society is for the community to exert "bottom-up" pressure by rallying wide-scale mass support for change.
According to Mahfud, a strong civil society formed by alliances of various non-governmental organizations will help nurture the demand for democratization among the people.
Another speaker at the seminar, Mochsan, said a overly powerful government could adversely affect society in general.
"Such an administration may result in the establishment of a complicated bureaucracy, in arrogance, and a reduction of individual rights," said Mochsan, who teaches law at the Gadjah Mada University.
The discussion was attended by some 700 people and also featured legal experts Yusril Ihza Mahendra and Sri Sumantri. (har/mds)