What's true democracy?
The road to democracy seems now to be jammed with noisy mopeds. The craze about politics in a newly freed Indonesia has revealed some strange behavior among young Indonesian males, especially in Bali where the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI) congress was held.
The enthusiasm for Megawati Soekarnoputri (chairman of the party) looked more like a football supporters' frenzy or rock star fans hysteria than anything related to political matters. Not that the PDI congress shouldn't be a feast, but does political awareness have anything to do with roaring motorbike engines, blowing horns or riding without helmets for seven days in a row? In fact, the PDI congress, at least out of the meeting place, has just been an opportunity for thousands of young left- out Indonesians to go crazy, unchained, and breath some freedom in an outgoing way. Just to get rid of their frustrations, their boredom, to have fun and forget about a society which far from gives them any hope of a better living. For most of them, their political awareness is close to zero, something understandable in a country just released from decades of dictatorship, but they grasp that Megawati is offering something unheard of before. And this was enough to convince the youngest of them to remove the Kurt Cobain stickers they usually put on the back of their mopeds and change it with ones of Mega. And so with this, T-shirts, flags and headbands have become commonplace all over Bali. So, what is the link between the dead rock star and the new Indonesian icon? Nothing, except political illiteracy.
Indonesia is now facing danger on its way to a true democracy, because political freedom is not a motorized rally and doesn't mean messing around in the streets, even in a friendly way. A real democratic system can only be implemented with mature and concerned citizens, otherwise chaos will be found just around the corner.
Before campaigning for the next elections, raising the political awareness of the people should be the first duty of the hundred parties that have flourished all over the country.
ERIC BUVELOT
Jimbaran, Bali