Reality contradicts President's state address

Reality contradicts President's state address

President B.J. Habibie set out his political and economic policies in his first state of the nation address on Aug. 15. Economist Kwik Kian Gie expresses his skepticism about their implementation.

JAKARTA (JP): President B.J. Habibie's state address on Aug. 15 was well received. It was comprehensive, systematic and logical. But whether it reflects reality and whether he has the intention or power to implement the concept are very different questions.

It is very likely there will be a big deviation between his speech and what he will accomplish.

In its substance, Habibie's speech was similar to those of his predecessor, Soeharto. All Soeharto's prepared speeches were very pleasant to listen to, but what he did was always different from what he had said he would do.

Habibie, for example, said: "International trust and support (for Indonesia) are currently very strong. In history, we have never accepted as large an amount of foreign aid as we will do this year."

However, high-ranking officials from donor countries have told me that they were merely taking pity on Indonesians who were facing the threat of hunger and the possible downfall of their government.

Habibie condemned sexual harassment against women, especially violence against the ethnic Chinese. But a large number of government officials have doubted the existence of such harassment and no single rapist has been arrested.

While a cabinet minister said that looting was tolerable as long as the looted goods were worth no more than 5 percent of the assets, Habibie said: "As a civilized nation with religious faith, we condemn such an uncivilized deed ... I am demanding support from the House of Representatives for strict measures that law enforcers will take against looters."

In reality, the number of looters arrested has been tiny. Residents of housing complexes as well as owners of plantations and shrimp ponds have to pay large sums of money to commercial security guards if they want their assets to be protected from looters.

Habibie also said that the legal system would be reformed and developed to make laws powerful. However, law enforcers view the conflicts involving the Indonesian Democratic Party, one of the essential pillars of the country's politics, as internal matters that cannot be resolved by recourse to law.

Furthermore, laws have never been implemented against untouchable elite officials. The murderers of journalist Fuad M. Syafruddin (Udin) and labor activist Marsinah, and the killers of four Trisakti University students, therefore, have not been discovered.

If Habibie said that political reform was aimed at creating clean and powerful governance, how about corrupt officials who are still active?

The President also talked about the eradication of corruption, collusion, cronyism and nepotism. But which officials will carry out such an eradication program if the result will affect themselves?

So, Habibie's speech can be accomplished only if the President himself is historically clean from corruption, collusion, cronyism and nepotism, very honest, charismatic, loved by the people, and has high integrity. Only such a president can recruit clean people as his assistants and dismiss corrupt officials.

The President also expressed his pride in the success of the state-owned PT Industri Pesawat Terbang Nusantara (IPTN) to create the C-250 aircraft, which he claimed was designed and engineered by Indonesians.

In reality, according to IPTN executives, the company has hired about 100 foreign engineers who are told to hide whenever the firm receives guests. Moreover, Indonesian mastery of sophisticated aircraft technology has had no trickle-down effect to the other industries. As a result, the country's manufacturing industry depends too much on imports and agriculture is not supported by adequate technology.

The President also promised more transparency but IPTN's financial reports have never been transparent. If Habibie, when he was state minister of research and technology and president of IPTN, said that the then president Soeharto had told him not to release the company's financial reports, why can he not do so now?

Also, why does the Indonesian Bank Restructuring Agency never disclose the audited financial reports of ailing banks?

In his economic program, Habibie continue to base his policies on the government's reform agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). That means that Indonesia's economic development will continue to depend largely on the inflow of foreign capital.

We must realize that in the last 32 years, our economy has been very fragile because we have developed it on the basis of footloose foreign capital, which is like the wind, not on domestic savings, which are like a solid substance.

The evidence shows that Indonesia's corporate debt has now reached US$80 billion and official debt totals $53 billion. The official foreign debt will increase by $14 billion when the government receives the disbursement of loans from the IMF and the Consultative Group on Indonesia (CGI) by the end of this fiscal year.

When the bankruptcy law comes into effect in the near future, the assets of debt-ridden companies will soon move to the hands of foreign creditors.

The economy has also worsened by the injection of some Rp 170 trillion ($13 billion) in printed money into 60 ailing banks.

So, how can we restore the confidence of foreign investors?

Another alternative is that we can rebuild the economy with our own human and natural resources. How can we do this? As Confucius said, a prosperous nation needs three prerequisites -- good leaders, food and weapons. Of the three, good leaders are the most essential element for a nation to become prosperous. Who are those leaders?