----------------------------------------------------------------------- IBRAHIM ISA'S -- SELECTED NEWS AND VIEWS, 10.01.07 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CLASSIC RIVALRY - EDITORIAL THE DIRECTION OF INDONESIQ IN 2007, M. Vatikiotis NOTED POLITICAL SCIENTIST MIRIAM BUDIARDJO DIES, Nationl News ------------------------------------------------------------------------- CLASSIC RIVALRY , The Jakarta Post Editorial, 10 jan 07 The Jakarta Post Editorial, 10 Jan 07 The nation's commitment to civil society is being tested again as the debate intensifies over the bill on national security, which includes a major revamp of the National Police. Public caution and openness in the bill's deliberation are needed to make sure the resulting law does not restore control over domestic security to the Indonesian Military (TNI). For 32 years Soeharto used the military's sociopolitical functions quite effectively as a machine to maintain his power. After his fall in 1998 the nation pledged that the TNI would oversee only defense and external security affairs, while the police would handle domestic security and public order. The public discourse changed considerably when TNI Commander Air Marshal Djoko Suyanto lashed out at the police for trying to retain their authority in security affairs, which he called "a big mistake". For the police, the problem primarily arises from an article that stipulates the police would come under the supervision of a ministry, likely either home or justice. The other source of the dispute lies in the drafting process, which police leaders say did not involve them. The draft law is sponsored by the Ministry of Defense. To counter the move, the National Police will draft an alternative bill, which would maintain the force's direct supervision by the president. Advocates of the national security bill, including Defense Minister Juwono Sudarsono, envision a professional police force which is no longer attached to the president. As in many democracies, the national or federal police would fall under the auspices of a ministry and their chief would not be a political appointee. They say the organizational overhaul of the police is a logical consequence of the People's Consultative Assembly Decree in 2000 that defined the division of labor between the police and the military. The 2004 defense law, in accordance with the decree, laid the foundation for the military's supervision under the Defense Ministry. Many say the law is a manifestation of the reform within the military. Professionalism is at stake when the police chief, as well as the TNI chief, directly answers to the President, as it opens up opportunities for abuses of power by the ruling regime as evident during the New Order. The possibilities are still there despite the reform movement. This became apparent in 2004 when the Banyumas police chief lost his job for allegedly campaigning for the re-election of president Megawati Soekarnoputri. More serious abuses are very likely to happen as the National Police, unlike the TNI, enjoy the luxury of formulating and executing policies and managing their own budget. As if to confirm the damage the police could do, the Governance Assessment Survey recently released by Yogyakarta's Gadjah Mada University found the public felt the police were Indonesia's most graft-ridden public agency. Modern countries, including neighboring Australia, opt to decentralize their police forces and limit the enforcement powers of the national police to national (federal) laws. For practical reasons, individual states or provinces run their own police forces to enforce laws within their own boundaries, since they deal with public order on daily basis. On top of that, security is the responsibility of every citizen, in accordance with the Constitution. The police themselves cannot handle security alone, although their success in uncovering the masterminds of a series of terror attacks in the past few years deserves recognition. In many cases, particularly when it comes to armed violence, the police need assistance from the military. But the objection of the police to the national security bill cannot be ignored. Placing the National Police under the Home Ministry, for example, may disrupt unity within the force and wreak havoc on national security as the regional police will think and act locally. The police are facing their toughest challenge now that the country, and the rest of the world, is dealing with cross-boundary crimes, such as terrorism, money laundering, human, arms and drug trafficking. To fight such crimes, the National Police require adequate authority. It's highly recommended, therefore, that the government invite the police, more scholars and experts as well as the general public to refine the bill before sending it to the House of Representatives. The debate over the bill should not be reduced to a continuation of the classic rivalry between the TNI and the police, nor should it reopen the military's path to security jobs. It's imperative, too, in order to help build a strong civil society, that the bill provide a bigger role to the community.
THE DIRECTION OF INDONESIAQ IN 2007 Michael Vatikiotis, Singapore Indonesia in 2006 enjoyed more stability, more well-being and more peace than at any time in more than sixty years of independence. The future looks bright and quite apart from the obvious benefits enjoyed by the Indonesian people, the wider world should expect to see Indonesia playing a more active role as a concerned global citizen. Bold as it is, this statement is aimed at dispelling some of the lingering perceptions about Indonesia's potential to fail. Such perceptions are misplaced and represent more than anything else the habitual pessimism of Indonesia watchers and many Indonesians themselves who have yet to wake up to the full potential of Indonesia's new found stability. The 2004 election of Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono as the countries first directly elected President closed a turbulent but transformative chapter of Indonesian history. The democratic transition lasted six long years and was marked by unstable, uncertain government which delayed essential reforms and left the world wondering if Indonesia would after all fail. The 2004 election gave everyone a stake in the political future so that when the contest was settled, there could be no arguing about legitimacy or process. The electorate embraced Yudhoyono because he came across as a man of honesty and integrity. In the two years he has been in office there is no indication that the electorate misread the man. Yudhoyono himself has spent the first two years in office playing safe, which in hindsight was probably a good way to placate and pacify all the disparate political forces left out of the new democratic power structure. By not ramming reforms too fast down everyone's throat, Yudhoyono has eased Indonesia out of the old autocratic framework and set a new heading for pluralism and democracy. Naysayers may point to a disappointing level of foreign direct investment, egregiously high levels of corruption and the slow pace of infrastructure development and bureaucratic reform. Neither are hard won freedoms all that evenly applied, as the recent arrest of some student discussing Marxism in Bandung and the jailing of a Muslim preacher who insisted on reading the Koran in Indonesian instead of Arabic suggests. Many Indonesians are still programmed to expect disaster around the corner. There is a deeply entrenched expectation that palace intrigue and factional infighting is a default position for Indonesian politics. Now the fear in fashionable Jakarta salon circles is that fundamentalist Islam is chipping away at Indonesia's traditional syncretism and moderate approach to religion. In fact, the rise of religiosity in politics is a rather healthy symptom of democracy, showing that people are free to express their beliefs and contest them at the ballot box -- and this certainly doesn't mean that the extremists always win. These lingering misgivings, though understandable, are misplaced. Far from coming apart at the seams, Indonesian society is maturing, and with maturity comes the ability to debate and disagree, or to manage affairs more autonomously. Whilst neighboring countries continue to manage their plural societies using mechanisms that keep communities apart, stifling any questioning of the lack of equality or integration, Indonesia has let things all hang out. The Chinese can behave like Chinese; Islamic conservatives can behave like Islamic conservatives if they like. There is no pressure to conform, which is sometimes mistakenly interpreted as a prelude to violence. The media highlights the small corners of militant excess and usually misses the larger picture of normative Indonesian behavior. Back in the 1980s, the late Indonesian military leader Edi Sudrajat used to complain that the army was always called upon to douse fires and acted as little more than a fire extinguisher. Today we see the slow development of self sufficiency in society and a capacity to cope at the local level. The pace is slow and there remains much to be done. Justice and the certainty and equality of law are huge priorities. But Indonesia's identity as a cohesive and successful nation state is no longer at risk. Rather, as the world's third largest democracy, we are on the point of experiencing Indonesia's potential as a global citizen. In this regards there are three areas I would like to explore to illustrate Indonesia's potential in the coming five years both in the national, regional and international context. 1. Democracy and Nation-building Indonesia is understandably proud of its democratic transition, even if the memory that lingers in many people's minds is of violent protests, the looting of property and scapegoating of Indonesian Chinese as the autocratic Soeharto regime fell in May 1998. Lost in the spectacle of violence and mayhem most often portrayed in the media is a steady and deliberate move towards anchoring democratic values and process in law. Indonesia also embarked on a massive exercise in decentralization, conferring autonomy in the day to day management of government and related services to over 400 local authorities. Although not as glamorous as the Presidential elections in 2004, more than 250 local elections have been held up and down the country selecting governors and mayors, reinforcing the habit and consequence of democracy and perhaps also creating a pool of leadership talent for the future. The scope and depth of Indonesia's democratic transition carries extra weight when set against the continuing travails of what were thought to be more mature and advanced democracies in Thailand and the Philippines. Chronic instability in the Philippines and a military intervention in Thailand underline the magnitude of what Indonesia has achieved. The critics will point out that Indonesia's democratic transition has been messy, protracted and therefore is hardly a model. Perhaps not, but the reality is that real political change is messy and for many countries in the developing world Indonesia's recent experience together with all the pitfalls and wrong turns, offers a more relevant and realistic model. Whilst Thailand's generals have reached back in time to an arcane model of bureaucratic patronage to fix their political system; Indonesia has made room for civil society and open political contest. Not surprisingly, Jakarta has started to develop views on its immediate neighborhood that are colored by new (or as many would argue newly restored) democratic principles. One of President Yudhoyono's first foreign policy initiatives was to try and convince the military junta in Myanmar to learn from Indonesia's transition from military to civilian democratic rule. Yudhoyono himself went to Rangoon and explained the transition to Senior General Than Shwe, who probably thought this younger general rather insolent and lectured him instead on the Myanmar army's essential role as the lynchpin of national stability. It was also interesting to note that Jakarta responded coolly to the military takeover in Bangkok. As ASEAN's largest member state this has potential consequences in the immediate region, where there are calls for democracy and human rights to be enshrined in an ASEAN charter; as the world's most populous Muslim nation, it has even greater implications for the wider Muslim world, in which Indonesia demonstrates that Islam and democracy are fully compatible. The writer is a visiting research fellow at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore. NOTED POLITICAL SCIENTIST MIRIAM BUDIARDJO DIES National News - January 09, 2007 Miriam Budiardjo, one of the country's first academics and who laid the foundations for the study of political science in Indonesia, died Monday after a long illness. She was 84. A close relative said Miriam had suffered from lung and kidney problems and had recently spent a month receiving intensive treatment at the Medistra Hospital in Central Jakarta. "But she was taken back to the hospital after a relapse," Aru Sudoyo, Miriam's niece, was quoted as saying by detik.com. She died at 2:05 p.m. at the hospital. Miriam was born in Kediri, East Java, in November 1923. She was one of the founders of the political science department at the University of Indonesia. Her book Dasar Dasar Ilmu Politik (Foundations in Political Science) is regarded as essential reading for political science students. Miriam will be remembered for introducing the concept of the modern nation state to the political science students of Indonesia. She enrolled in the then Law and Arts College in Jakarta in 1947 and after completing her undergraduate degree in 1950, flew to the United States, where she completed a master's degree in political science at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., and a PhD at Harvard. While pursuing her master's degree, Miriam worked part-time at the Indonesian Embassy in Washington. She began her teaching career at the University of Indonesia in 1962, after a stint at the university's community research center. She was dean of the social sciences department from 1974 to 1979 and retired from the university in 1989, after years working as a political science professor and researcher. Later, Miriam was named an emeritus professor at the university and taught its postgraduate students. In 1993, at the height of the New Order regime, Miriam was appointed a member of the National Commission on Human Rights. Miriam's son-in-law, sociologist Imam Prasodjo, said her remains would be buried at Giritama Public Cemetery in Bogor on Tuesday. * * *
