What is the cost?

What is the cost?

Is there any comparison at all between demonstrators who over-
react and cause damage when protesting against the recent price
hikes and the release of fraudulent bankers from legal charges?
Which of the two groups did more damage to the country? Following
on from that, how are the two groups viewed and treated by the
authorities, and which of the two groups finish up in prison?

Easy questions to answer, and the Indonesian Democratic Party
of Struggle (PDI-Perjuangan) deputy party chairman in Central
Sulawesi has no doubts whatsoever that the demonstrators who did
damage to their offices should face justice. So what is justice
and to whom does it apply? Maybe that question is a little harder
to answer, as justice is obviously a variable and therefore not
fairly administered.

What was the cost of the damage to the PDI-Perjuangan office
and what was the cost in trillions of the action of the bankers?
What will it cost to safeguard the inauguration of the Governor
in Southeast Sulawesi and what was the cost of security to get
Sutiyoso re-elected?

Megawati was forced to cancel her trip to Poso in Central
Sulawesi as the cost to the nation was considered too high a
risk. So what is the cost to the nation? Money would only be a
small part, with the damage to moral and to nationalism enormous,
and probably incalculable. What is the moral cost to the nation
for allowing Akbar Tandjung to remain as the speaker in the House
of Representatives, and what does it say for justice?

Perhaps Megawati should make a simple list of the perceived
injustices that occur every week and compare that with efforts
being made to eradicate corruption and see if she thinks that the
demonstrators may have a point.

Another way would be to roughly calculate the overall cost of
maintaining the status quo and then consider how that amount of
money would benefit education or in a drive to solve the
unemployment problem. Or she could look at the cost of all the
many failures and weigh that up against the reluctance of
foreign investors to participate in this country's future. No
doubt the damage done to the PDI-P office will take top priority,
but the real cost to Megawati may well become clearer in the 2004
general election.

Is it really a wonder that she feels misunderstood?

DAVID WALLIS, Medan, North Sumatra