Sang Alpha Republic
“I learned that courage is not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it… The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.” (Nelson Mandela)
That night in early May 1986, the lights in the Prioritas newsroom were still on. The printing press had just stopped turning. That day’s edition had been printed, in colour on the front and back pages. No newspaper in Indonesia had ever dared to do that before.
A young man with a thick moustache stood watching sheet after sheet emerge from the machine. He knew this was not merely a newspaper. It was a great gamble. An act of courage to appear different in the midst of a uniform press world full of self-censorship.
Years later, the man whose full name is Surya Dharma Paloh is remembered not because he always won. He is remembered because he never stopped taking positions on the front line. This is the story of someone who, from a young age, chose to be a player in history. Not a spectator.
COLOUR AMIDST BLACK AND WHITE
Before becoming a media tycoon, he was just a teenager selling salted fish and hessian sacks in Serbelawan, Simalungun, North Sumatra. He walked from one shop to another, from plantation to plantation, while carrying his school books. From this he learned one important lesson: the courage to take risks is always directly proportional to the results obtained.
He brought that principle into the press world. Prioritas was first published on 2 May 1986. Many doubted it. Colour printing was considered wasteful. Its daring photographs were deemed to cross the line. Yet within months, its circulation exceeded 100,000 copies. It reached its break-even point before it was even a year old.
That joy did not last long. One day, after 13 months of publication, a letter revoking its Press Publication Business Licence (SIUPP) arrived on his desk at the end of June 1987. Prioritas was considered too naked in exposing the facts. It was deemed to have violated its operating licence, although most parties knew that the newspaper’s presence had disturbed the political stability of the New Order. For anyone else, this could have been the end. For Surya Paloh, it became fuel instead.
He did not give up on the press world. Two years later, he revived Media Indonesia. He slowly built up that newspaper. And today we can still enjoy its news coverage and opinion pieces. In 1999, amid the turbulence of reformasi, Surya Paloh did something even bigger. He founded Metro TV. Indonesia’s first 24-hour news television station. While other stations competed to broadcast soap operas, he chose the quiet road. News, all day, every day. Many in the industry considered that decision risky. Once again, he proved right. To this day, the station is still on air.
A POLICEMAN’S SON AMIDST THE ABRI RANKS
Let us go back to Jakarta, in the late 1970s. At a gathering attended by children of retired ABRI officers from various regions, a young man from North Sumatra stood up to speak. He was not a general’s son. His father was a police officer, not military. Yet in that room, his was the voice most heard.
On 12 September 1978, a new organisation was officially declared: the Communication Forum of the Sons and Daughters of Indonesian Veterans (FKPPI). The young man was appointed chairman of the presidium, as well as first general chairman of its central board. This was the same young man who would later found the Prioritas daily and Metro TV.
Imagine his position at the time. A policeman’s son leading a vast rank of soldiers’ children. During the New Order! This was not a position that came from lineage. Nor from a service uniform. It was purely about the ability to convince people. To embrace differing interests. To build trust from zero.
In fact, the same trail had been visible since he led the Youth and Student Action Unit (KAPPI) in his hometown of Simalungun. He was barely a teenager at the time. There was something in him that made others willing to follow his direction. A leadership instinct that cannot be taught in any school.
LOSING THE CONVENTION, WINNING ON PRINCIPLE
The year 2004. The Golkar Party’s presidential candidate convention hall was filled with hundreds of regional officials from across Indonesia. Surya Paloh ran as one of the candidates. This was not a closed contest among elites. This was an open competition that put one’s reputation at stake before the public.
The result: he came third. It was Wiranto who eventually ran as the presidential candidate of the banyan tree party. For many politicians, such a defeat usually ends in intrigue. Or a retreat into dark corners. But that was not what Surya Paloh did. He accepted the convention’s result gracefully. For him, this was part of a principle he had held from the start. Power must be seized through genuine democratic mechanisms. Through the most votes. Not through compromises behind closed doors.
He carried that principle all the way to the parliament building in Senayan. Throughout his career, he believed that seats of power rightly belong to the people who vote. Not to a handful of elites arranging matters behind the scenes. When he later lost his strategic position in Golkar after the 2009 National Congress, he did not choose the path of revenge. He chose a far braver path: building a new stage from scratch.
A NEW HOUSE
The year 2010. Surya Paloh sat with several figures discussing something that had no great name yet. A movement that would later be called Nasional Demokrat. A year after that, the movement officially gave birth to a political party: the NasDem Party.
Their slogan was simple but bold: the Restoration of Indonesia. It was not merely a campaign slogan. It was a statement of attitude by someone who, when his old house could no longer contain his grand ideas, chose to leave. He built his own house from the most basic foundation.
The results did not take long to show. In its first general election in 2014, NasDem immediately broke into the top ten, winning 6.72% of the national vote.
Five years later, that figure jumped to 9.05%, and reached 9.65% in the 2024 election. The party’s position rose from seventh to the top five. A party born from one man’s resolve. In less than a decade, it became a force to be reckoned with in the Republic.
A MARTYR OF DEMOCRACY
The year 2014. Amid the contest for the presidency, many parties chose to play it safe. They backed established, proven figures. Surya Paloh took a different road. NasDem became the first party to openly support Joko Widodo. A figure who was then still seen as a new face, untested on the national stage.
A similar pattern kept repeating throughout his journey. He gave his backing to figures such as Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, Anies Baswedan, and Ridwan Kamil, in various political contests, both regional and national. Not all those bets ended sweetly. Some resulted in coalition tensions, and even considerable political costs for his own party.
One moment that best captures his character occurred ahead of Anies Baswedan’s presidential bid in 2024. At the time, 1 October 2023, Surya Paloh was lying ill in Singapore. From his sickbed, he received a report on the potential criminalisation of Anies. His response was direct. Without the slightest hesitation. “Let us immediately declare Anies as a presidential candidate,” he said. “We must safeguard democracy. This declaration will be a fortress of democracy.”
A day later he was already in Jakarta, even though his body had not fully recovered. At NasDem Tower, he gathered several colleagues from other parties. Before them, he conveyed his position calmly but firmly. “Tomorrow I will declare Anies as a presidential candidate,” he said. “The situation demands it. There will certainly be consequences. But this is the choice I shall make. If Dinda wishes to come along with me, alhamdulillah. But if not, there is no problem.”
History then records that after the declaration on 3 October 2024, political pressure came in waves against NasDem and Surya Paloh himself. Yet that is perhaps the deepest meaning of his long journey. The willingness to take personal and institutional risks to make room for new faces to be tested on the democratic stage. He did not simply think about winning and losing. He did not choose the safe and comfortable path. He chose to become a ‘martyr of democracy’, with the courage to take a stand at even the most uncomfortable of points.
EPILOGUE
From a teenager selling salted fish in Serbelawan to the founder of a media consortium and a political party that commands respect in this Republic. Surya Paloh’s journey is the story of someone who has consistently chosen to be on the front line. Not in the ranks of spectators.
He dared to be colourful when the world chose black and white. He dared to lead when his legitimacy was questioned. He dared to build a new house when the old one was no longer sufficient. He dared to bet on the future, even when the outcome was uncertain.
That is what makes him worthy of being called the Alpha of the Republic. Not because he always wins. But because he has always dared to take a position on the front line of his nation’s history.
Happy 75th birthday, my brother, Surya Paloh. You are a narrative and a long journey that will continue to inspire us, the movement generation of Indonesia.