RI politics still a host of uncertainties

RI politics still a host of uncertainties

By Peter Richards

This is the first of two articles on possible developments in
Indonesian politics ahead of the general election planned for May
1999.

JAKARTA (JP): Eighteen weeks of living dangerously began on
May 21, when president Soeharto stepped down.

This second year of dangerous life will be different from the
first because it has different goals.

* The reversal of the economic collapse that has affected all
Indonesians except those with millions of U.S. dollars in foreign
bank accounts and those who have always lived at a subsistence
level.

* The political and economic restructuring of Indonesia so that
it will not be possible in the future for more Indonesians to
prosper in good times and to survive with dignity in bad times.

Both goals require capital, a quicksilver commodity currently
in short supply in Indonesia.

It turns out that capital flows from foreign governments and
international financial institutions, though larger than ever
this year, are not enough. It seems that foreign private capital
is needed to stimulate the repatriation and investment of
domestic private capital.

This foreign capital will not begin to come until there is a
certain level of confidence about the details of the post-
Soeharto system. Indonesia is risky and big business and,
notwithstanding its rhetoric, likes to minimize risk and assure
return on investment. Besides, there are many other places crying
out for capital.

So Indonesia's problem is how to deliver a system of
sufficient probable stability and predictability to satisfy
foreign and Indonesian investors. Anything related to the
Soeharto era lacks persuasive value. So what is needed is a
process that delivers a "legitimate" government that has the
credibility to reassure investors.

"Legitimacy" is no longer a matter of (only)
bureaucratic/military/police protection against competition and
unhappy dispossessed landowners and restive workers. The reform
process has set loose various lobbies in the deceptive form of
prototype political parties. Many of their positions cannot be
easily ignored.

The current plan pins hopes on a political process, including,
centrally, a liberalized press and the election of House of
Representatives (DPR) members, that will sort out these
contending claims. It will thus yield a more accurate sense of
what Indonesians want, and will challenge rather than meekly put
up with the past platitudes of the government's various public
affairs branches.

The process up to the elections of May 1999 is important, and
so are the political negotiations that will precede the General
Session of the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) in late 1999.
This MPR session is after all charged with the selection of
Indonesia's president and the elaboration of the broad state
guidelines for the first five years of the 21st century.

Indonesians and interested foreigners will be watching closely
the political reform process, including the debates on the bills
on political parties, the restructuring of the DPR and the MPR,
the formation of political parties and the conduct of the general
election. They will be watching also how the successful and
unsuccessful parties behave after the election as they politick
to identify the next Indonesian president and vice president for
the period 2000/2005.

In 2000 Indonesia reopens for business, initially with the
tentativeness of the early 1970s but hopefully accelerating on
the basis of the strength (and strengthening) of Indonesia's
physical and institutional infrastructure.

So what can go wrong in the next year? Three things for
starters.

* Engineered violence that requires the Armed Forces (ABRI) to
intervene, thus risking reversion to the practices of the
Soeharto regime or something even less attractive to Indonesians
and foreign investors.

* The excessive reliance by the incumbent Golkar party on its
funding, organizational and influence advantages in the run-up to
the selection of the new Indonesian regime.

* The refusal by some major political party or force (for
whatever reason) to accede to the outcome of the political
process of 1998/1999.

President B.J. Habibie has said the government will suppress
sporadic violence and looting. And many claim that even peaceful
political activity is unduly circumscribed.

But the real danger lies with those faceless people with the
means to mobilize and even train people motivated by the despair
of their hungry children or with no higher motive than thuggery.
In a word, people in or with contacts in the military and its
integrated police force.

There is a natural desire to unmask the authors (in uniform
and not) of a whole series of episodes since 1996 if not before.
How far back is it useful to go? Surely, at least as far back as
the July 27, 1996, rioting after the forcible takeover of the
Indonesian Democratic Party's (PDI) headquarters; the kidnapping,
detention and torture of students; the killing of the Trisakti
University students; and the looting, murder and rapes in the
middle of May.

Not just so that justice may be done, desirable though that
is. But so that the "engineers" of the recent past cannot act
again and that others think twice before imitating them. As the
May incidents showed, these people do not seem to understand that
the world has changed dramatically since 1965.

The ideological calculations of the Cold War can no longer
excuse the bestiality of friendly governments. Electronic media
envelop the planet. It is harder to get away with murder. And,
thanks to modern communications and the transparent shamelessness
of the late New Order government, Indonesians are vastly more
politically aware.

The writer is a former Canadian diplomat who is now working as
a tourism marketing consultant for the Indian Union Territory of
Pondicherry. He has written this article in his private capacity.