Training new councillors
The cheerful afternoon vote count in Jakarta and suburban areas on April 5 has produced new faces to serve on the Jakarta city council. Two new upstarts, the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) and the Democratic Party (PD) have provisionally won 18 and 16 seats respectively. The Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle(PDI-P), which previously had 30 seats, is now in third place with only 11 seats.
This sends a clear message to the newly elected councillors (only 15 out of 75 are old faces) that Jakarta needs a change. The high hopes of the people for cleaner government are at stake. Syamsuddin Harris of the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI) said the new council would be more active as it will be dominated by new faces that are expected to be more critical of Governor Sutiyso's administration (The Jakarta Post, April 19).
No less than Ali Wongso, the director of Institute for Regional Empowerment Studies, said that the fact that the two "upstart" parties would be the biggest factions on the council would give new color to the political map of Jakarta (Kompas, April 19). All they have to do now is to live up to their pledges, including that by the PKS to strive for cheap, affordable and quality education and health services for everybody. Besides, they have said they would try to restructure the Jakarta administration to make it more efficient and effective.
However, it has become a habit for the political parties to hastily select inexperienced candidates, leaving them poorly prepared for their new jobs once elected. Therefore, training in the competencies required for good governance is needed before they take up their terms.
The parties should allow government training institutes to train their new councillors for a few months. In this way, there we would get competent and accountable councillors who sincerely work in the interests of the people they represent.
All the problems faced by the capital city must first be thoroughly understood, including the various forms of corruption that are so prevalent.
For the PKS and PD, all this will be a challenge. These political parties are known for their commitment to clean and good governance, something that deserves the support of the public.
M. RUSDI
Jakarta