Separatism fears haunt regional autonomy plan

JAKARTA (JP): Fears of renewed separatism and the trauma of federalism have continued to haunt the government as it launched this year a long standing plan to give the regions greater autonomy, experts said yesterday.

Indria Samego of the Center for Information and Development Studies noted that the government has been half-hearted in its approach towards the regional autonomy plan.

"The central government should be really willing to hand over (part of its) political authority and resources to the regions," said Indria said at a seminar on regional autonomy held by the Center.

"Too much fear of the impact of regional autonomy on primordial tendencies will be counter productive," said Indria who also works at the center on regional policy of the Indonesian Institute for Sciences.

"Primordialism" is the term now often used by Indonesian political scientists to describe the return of sectarian sentiments found in society.

Another speaker at the seminar, noted human rights lawyer Adnan Buyung Nasution, also criticized the government's "trauma of federalism and separatism and primordialism" saying that overt concerns have led to the repression of the region's interests by the central government.

Nasution underlined that the ideals of Indonesia's founding fathers as embodied in the national motto "Unity in Diversity" have not been fulfilled.

What Indonesia has instead is "unity in totality" in which the central government has a strong hand in the affairs of the regions, said the lawyer who wrote The Aspiration of Constitutional Government in Indonesia for his doctorate thesis in 1992.

In the 50 years since its independence, Indonesia has had to deal with a number of rebellions and attempts at separatism. In the early years of independence, there were also attempts at establishing a federal state.

Although the House of Representatives enacted the law on regional autonomy as far back as 1974, the government only this year launched the pilot project, testing the giving of more autonomy to 26 selected regencies. The pilot project is to run for two years before the regional autonomy plan can be expanded to all areas.

Sumitro Maskun, the director General for General Administration and Regional Autonomy at the Ministry of Home Affairs, told the seminar yesterday that under the regional autonomy plan, the government will continue to exercise some control "in the framework of an unitary state"

The speakers highlighted the problem of the regions' heavy dependence on central government handouts, something which they said results from the reluctance to hand over resources to the regions.

Official figures show that on average, the government is subsidizing nearly 60 percent of each provincial administration budget.

Maskun pointed out that in the fiscal year of 1992/1993 the total share of locally generated income by the 27 provincial administrations amounted to only Rp 1.74 trillion ($790 million), or just 26 percent of the total provincial budgets for that year. Ironically, he pointed out, the percentage share of regional income declined the following year to 25 percent.

Maskun stressed that central government agencies must not feel robbed of their powers when a number of their authorities and resources are designated to lower levels.

"The decentralization of authority to lower levels must be aimed at increasing the ability of the regions to serve their citizens," Maskun said.

He added that the government is now formulating a regulation on how "centuries-old indigenous autonomy" can be "tuned in" with autonomy within the bureaucracy. (anr)