Signs of political immaturity

The campaigns of the 1997 general election have grown increasingly violent. Regretfully, reports of vandalized public facilities, human casualties, clashes between supporters of rival election contestants and between campaigners and security officers, terror on the roads and other acts of mayhem fill the pages of our newspapers every day. Meanwhile, we also know that the costs involved in holding the elections are immense.

Amid all the acts of violence and vandalism and the considerations of costs involved, we also note a number of dishonest practices that have been committed which degrade the quality of the 1997 general election. The leaked Gading Cempaka document, Operasi Fajar (Operation Dawn), the letter of instruction circulated within the Ministry of Information and the mobilization of first-time voters in East Jakarta are a few cases in point.

For the past three decades, mobilization, machinations from above, and control and stability preservation have been the main instruments used in the execution of our development efforts. As we enter a new era, however, a demand has emerged for the allowance of greater popular initiative and autonomy, for setting up a political mechanism that operates from below, for the extension of political rights and for the institution of a style of government based on consensus.

So far, general elections have been functioning only on a formal plane: They have been effective in providing legitimacy to the government, but they have not been successful in actuating people's sovereignty or establishing a representative government. The 1997 general election shows that while society has undergone an economic transformation, people have not necessarily become politically mature. While the political trappings of state are in place, the democratic process has yet to be completed.

What we see at present signals the convergence of a politically immature political system with a society that is equally politically immature. Under these circumstances, neither barring campaigns nor disposing of the general election altogether would offer a solution. It would be more meaningful to revise our present structural, procedural and control-oriented political development program and redirect it so it can bring about greater maturity.

-- Republika, Jakarta