The elections: Substance or babble?

Elwin Tobing, The Indonesian Institute, Jakarta, elwin@theindonesianinstitute.org

As Indonesia enters the third month of the year, political parties are busily preparing themselves and extending their best wishes for the general election set for April. By all accounts, after the chaotic period that preceded the past elections in 1999, the country deserves to be at peace during this election campaign.

Although it has been reported that more than 180,000 security personnel from the military and police, as well as civilian guards, will take part in providing security during the elections in the West Java alone, security is still seen at risk. Already the authorities have warned that Malaysian terror suspect Azahari, who is though to still be at large here, could launch more attacks during the general election.

Besides security, there is another important concern that is fundamentally related to the essence of the elections itself. That is, will this general election just be business as usual? Will it be more money politics and no substance? Moreover, will the political elite view this election just politics as usual? Can they plot and ploy, and disregard the people's votes?

If we are to be guided by the last general election, the election of regional executives throughout the years, the behavior of major political parties and the poor commitment of the political elite to a clean and ideal election, an election inspired by substance rather than a quest for power, our concerns seem to be legitimate.

Less than six weeks away from the elections, the people still have no idea what the political parties are offering to improve the nation. The number of participating parties itself has already made it difficult for people to differentiate between one party and the next. But even more troubling, how can the people distinguish one party's ideas and programs from those of another? The familiar distinguishing indicators are the parties' ideologies: Nationalism, religion and somewhere in between.

While this ideological-based categorization is important, it can oversimplify or reduce the things that matter most to the nation. In reality, ideological differences are only one of three ultimate challenges to the nation, besides power-sharing and resource-sharing. Encapsulating these challenges in three words, they are: Unity, democracy and prosperity.

Unfortunately, we can hardly see any coherent ideas and plans from the parties in responding to these last two challenges. Objectively, political parties embracing an exclusive ideology cause us to doubt their ideas and plans for promoting democracy.

After all, democracy is about inclusion, not exclusion. And equally doubtful are their ideas and plans about prosperity because prosperity is about developing together and sharing resources. In economic terms, it is about equality and a better standard of living. It is hard to imagine equality springing from an exclusive view.

That leaves us to wonder about the agendas of the political parties in promoting democracy and in realizing prosperity. Put simply, what should the people be exposed to in order to be able to make a proper judgment about choosing their representatives and their president? For the elections to be about substance, the people should be provided with as many opportunities as possible to learn about the political parties' ideas and programs.

For instance, where do the parties stand and what are their ideas on (1) revamping the judicial system, (2) combating corruption, (3) promoting a regionally balanced and more equal socioeconomic development, (4) reducing poverty, (5) creating jobs; answering the problem of our unskilled workers who continually are migrating to neighboring countries only, for some, to face hard lives; attracting investment; restoring the banking and financial system, (6) significantly improving our education system, (7) educating the youth so that these young people become assets rather than liabilities to the nation's future, (8) improving the welfare of children and youths so that we can keep our children away from drugs, sex slavery and criminal activities, (9) improving the health of the nation and (10) combating terrorism.

Hardly do we see these things explained clearly and coherently by the political parties. Instead, they are so keen to talk about, for instance, combating corruption without a clear sense or urgency of how to really combat it. Also, some of these parties state their concern about foreign debt without really explaining how to improve our economy and create jobs. What we are really seeing from these parties are "babble platforms".

Don't the political parties realize that elections are all about ideas, concepts, plans, communication and intellectually sound strategies? While communication is important, it will be dangerous if they view it as the single determinant factor in winning votes.

Perhaps their paradigm is governed by the commonly accepted but misleading notion that good advertising is key to successful marketing. But just like everything in life, except for stupidity, things always have their limits. With good advertising, one may successfully sell poor quality goods, but soon people will discover the tricks behind it.

Or, we can fool some people all of the time, but we cannot fool the same "some people" all of the time. It would be a great mistake if the political parties bought into the advertising paradigm and thereby kept promoting "babble platforms" instead of discussing and promoting substance.

In the U.S., for instance, when Bill Clinton from the Democratic Party campaigned for the presidency in 1992, he came up with an ingenuous slogan: "It's the economy, stupid", capturing the concern of the American people about the economy, helping him win the election. And George W. Bush in 2000 came along with his educational reform campaign and won the election. The bottom line is, each participating party must offer things that are not only universally accepted, but also the main challenges to the nation.

But to formulate the challenges, the political parties must work hard, be realistic and be inclusive. They need more idealistic and knowledgeably sound individuals to challenge others and the nation intellectually, not barisan muda to intimidate others physically. They need to offer the people hope and the strategies to realize this hope, not rob them of hope.

As the people get smarter, it is time for the major political parties to switch their focus from babble to substance. Perhaps six weeks are not enough to discover, define, analyze and sharpen their platforms, but it is better late than never.