Where do we stand now?

It is perhaps in the very nature of presidential state-of-the- nation addresses to view the situation that prevails with optimism, to emphasize the successes and achievements that have been attained and gloss over the nation's failings. In this respect, President Megawati Soekarnoputri's speech before the House of Representatives on the eve of Indonesia's Independence Day on Friday was no exception.

Let it be noted, however, that to say this is not to view the situation from a perspective of total gloom. Since the fall of the Soeharto regime in 1998, progress has indeed been made on the nation's long and arduous path toward democratic reform, albeit slowly, and pitfalls abound.

The President correctly noted that the string of amendments -- recently adopted by the People's Consultative Assembly -- to the 1945 Constitution, are about to usher in important changes to the nation's political life and structure. The Constitution is itself a historically important document that, in the course of Indonesia's brief history as an independent nation, has already produced two dictatorial regimes, with the possibility of more in the future unless it is replaced or amended.

Every Indonesian, President Megawati reminded the assembled legislators, would therefore have to be keenly aware that the nation was at present taking a big step forward, whose enormous impact would be felt in the decades that lay ahead. Also, Megawati said, the current period of democratic reform posed a number of challenges that had to be addressed. For example, according to Megawati, unlike the executive-heavy regimes of the past, the center of gravity of state administration now lay with the legislative assembly, "which calls for great statesmanship on behalf of legislators."

All in all, the President's state-of-the-nation address on Friday did not deviate from the norm. It did touch on some of the most important issues the nation is facing at present. Given the doubts that exist within the public as to the direction in which the reform movement is currently moving, it was, however, what was left unsaid, or was mentioned only vaguely or in passing, that is raising questions by the public at large.

Surely, the question of continuing violence in Aceh deserved some mention -- all the more so, given the hints that the President made in an address to the Annual Session of the People's Consultative Assembly earlier this month of stronger security measures by the Police and Military in that troubled province, not to mention reform in the Military.

Activists working in or with the myriad non-governmental organizations must also be asking themselves -- and doing so with a considerable degree of unease -- what Megawati could have meant by her remark on Friday that, while some of these organizations were "in fact constructive", others were either "irresponsible" or "not very credible" and that "things will have to be sorted out so that the position and role of these organizations may gain a proper place in the new order that we all desire."

Certainly, there is no shortage of problems in this country at present. Some four years after president Soeharto's resignation, corruption still remains one of the country's worst cancers, in urgent need of drastic surgical attention. Some observers even maintain that corruption at present is worse and more all- pervasive than ever before.

Despite all the rhetoric about eradicating corruption, precious little seems to have been done about it. The judiciary, for one, is said to be one of the institutions most riddled with corruption. The bureaucracy is another branch of government where corruption still seems to thrive. Given this state of affairs, it is small wonder that investors prefer to stay away and invest their money elsewhere.

In conclusion, the general air of optimism notwithstanding, Megawati's state-of-the-nation address on Friday severely lacked a sense of direction. The fact is that the nation might have been more disposed to bear the hardships of the present had the people been able to sense or know where the government was coming them.

This was equally as true during the regime of Indonesia's first president, Sukarno, Indonesia's "great communicator". More's the pity that his daughter, Megawati, should have failed to follow in her father's footsteps in at least this one respect.