Success or failure?

After four tense days of debates heavily marred by violent clashes and bloodshed in the streets outside the impressive conference building, the much touted Special Session of the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) is over. Convened purportedly to lead the nation toward a better future and greater democracy in the wake of the downfall in May of president Soeharto's autocratic New Order regime, no cost or effort was apparently spared to make a success of the event.

Among the most conspicuous of those measures as far as the public is concerned was easily the heavy security precautions under which were deployed not only were tens of thousands of police and military personnel but also over a hundred amateur civilian "guards" armed with bamboo spears, knives and machetes. The question now is: what does the Assembly have to show for all that money and all the effort spent?

As anticipated, a number of MPR decrees, drafted and prepared beforehand by a specially formed working committee, were adopted to ensure greater democracy and stricter adherence to the Constitution. Some of those drafts underwent modifications to better accommodate the public's aspirations. For example, a draft decree on good governance was "improved" by the inclusion of a directive to investigate the alleged wealth of ex-president Soeharto and his family and cronies.

In a way the just-concluded MPR session did display a performance that was a good deal better than that of 1997, when it elected Soeharto to a seventh term in office as president of the republic and passed decrees that were designed merely to ensure he would continue to rule undisturbed. Nevertheless, there are sure to be many among us who would consider this Special Session a failure, at least in the sense that it has generally failed to accommodate the aspirations of the people and turned a deaf ear to the grievances and demands of reformers and critics of the government and its ruling party, Golkar.

This, though, is not only understandable but expected since, by and large, the present Assembly is despite some reshuffles still essentially the same old New Order product that only eight months ago reelected Soeharto and endowed him with extra powers to cope with emergencies that could threaten his rule. The best one could say is that considering such a background the MPR did quite a good job making an about-face. The fact that this kind of attitude on the part of the people's representatives is, to many people, not very reassuring is, of course, another matter.

One issue that is sure to disappoint critics concerns the presence of appointed members of the Indonesian Armed Forces (ABRI) in the House of Representatives. Although their numbers will be reduced, to many critics their continued presence is proof of ABRI's reluctance to relinquish its dual (sociopolitical as well as security and defense) functions, which many consider to be not only unfair, but an obstacle to democratization and could contribute to the feeling that ABRI is insincere in its stated support of democratic reform.

One final comment that cannot be overlooked concerns the excessive security precautions during the session. The deployment of untrained civilian guards in particular, has drawn considerable criticism from the public and observers, who see them as having contributed, rather than prevented, to the violence and the clashes during the session. Most unfortunately, since many of those "guards" operate under the potentially divisive banners of religion, their deployment and their actions could inadvertently become the starting point of more and greater conflicts in society.

What all this signifies for the current administration of President B.J. Habibie is that these deplorable developments could weaken rather than bolster his already inadequate legitimacy. For those in power it should be remembered that their right to use armed might is given to them by the people, to be used with wisdom and restraint.