RI democracy: A new paradigm?

RI democracy: A new paradigm?

I believe that the people of Indonesia can be optimistic about
the Abdurrahman Wahid-Megawati Soekarnoputri duo. This is a good
and winning ticket on paper. Now they face a tremendous task,
putting Indonesia's economy back on track, knowing all the debts
already accumulated under Soeharto's and Habibie's drives.

To accomplish that task, they will need a clear vision looking
right into the future of the country and its silent majority.
Focusing on the past would be a mistake. So they should put all
cases of corruption, collusion and nepotism in the hands of the
Ministry of Justice and ensure that they are handled by a clean
and fair minister of justice. During these investigations, they
will have to focus on more important points on their agenda.

That agenda could comprise the improvement of the welfare of
the Indonesian people, the launching of federalism of the country
to preserve its unity, the development of training programs in
various ministries, the alleviation of discrimination from laws,
the establishment of antimonopoly laws, the increase of civil
servants' wages to decent levels (a minimum of four times current
levels).

I believe that by looking at the composition of the Cabinet,
we already have lots of indications. I am optimistic that the
above can be done if the will is there. For a democracy to raise
or exist, you need to have a clear opposition movement. But the
way politics is culturally run in Indonesia does not allow a
clear picture of the pros and cons in our legislative bodies.
However, maybe Indonesia does not need the (Western) opposition
concept in politics. Maybe Indonesia is on the verge of coming up
with a new (Eastern) approach to democracy which would be based
on elections and national conciliation at the government level.
That would avoid part of the Indonesian people being left out of
the decision process. In a way, that could be a new model of
democracy even better than the current models developed during
the last 200 years by the Western democracies. The Utusan
Golongan (groups' representatives) you have here is, in my
opinion, a plus.

Still the government will have to take lots of unpopular
decisions because all the money borrowed by Indonesia in the past
and in the near future will have to be paid back and many
subsidies will have to be cut.

I hope that the new leaders of this country will act with
integrity and honesty to enhance the spirit of democracy in their
own country. I also appeal to Western democracies to assist
Indonesia by pushing the IMF to reschedule, in a different and
more clever way (not on a time basis), the overall Indonesian
debt and to allow Indonesia to subsidize basic commodities
concerning the lowest social categories. If not, we -- Western
democracies -- would still be acting as mere and violent
colonialists.

YVAN MAGAIN

Bandung, West Java