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Indonesia Political Dynamics
Openness
In his 1990 annual National Day address to the nation,
Suharto confirmed his mandate for more openness in
political
expression. "We must no longer be afraid of the
multifarious
views and opinions expressed by the people," he declared.
This
new tolerance was first given attention in the domestic
political
dialogue that began after his inauguration for a fifth
term. The
year 1989 saw an outpouring of opinion, discussion, and
debate as
keterbukaan (openness) promised a breath of fresh
air in
what many felt was an atmosphere of sterile platitudinism
and
sloganeering. There was in 1989, according to American
political
scientist Gorden R. Hein, "a dramatic expansion in public
discussion of important political and economic issues
facing the
country." Officials, politicians, retired generals,
nongovernmental organizations, and student leaders
expressed
their views on controversial subjects ranging from
environmental
degradation to business conglomerates, from the role of
the
military to party politics. Many who had previously felt
excluded
from meaningful involvement hoped that keterbukaan
would
encourage greater political participation, not only in the
national policy dialogue but in access to the political
process.
The most serious structural manifestation of
keterbukaan
was the establishment in 1991 of the Democracy Forum. The
forum
was chaired by Nahdatul Ulama's secretary general,
Abdurrahman
Wahid, and participated in by well-known academics,
journalists,
and other intellectuals. Its goal was to loosen existing
political arrangements to assure "that the nation matures
politically."
The turn toward keterbukaan was a welcome thaw
after
the chill of the mid-1980s crackdown on what the
government
considered "subversive" opposition. The passage of the
Mass
Organizations Law in 1985 stoked the incendiary
environment in
which more radical Muslim activists were prepared for
direct
action against a government that resisted demands that the
state
itself should express an Islamic quality. In September
1984, the
situation had deteriorated over an incident in which a
soldier
allegedly defiled a mosque in Tanjung Priok (in the
northern part
of Jakarta). The incident was a pretext for rioting and
clashes
between the army and mobs provoked by fiery Islamic
invocations.
This was followed by bomb blasts and arson that to an
alarmed
ABRI presaged a call for jihad (holy war). The Tanjung
Priok
affair was the most destabilizing open confrontation
between the
government and opposition since the anti-Japanese riots
that took
place during Japanese prime minister Tanaka Kakuei's visit
to
Indonesia in January 1974. Again, the government's
reaction was
swift and stern. Thirty defendants were jailed from one to
three
years in the wake of the Tanjung Priok riot. Ten people
were
convicted of conspiracy in the 1985 Bank Central Asia
bombing
following the Tanjung Priok affair, including former
cabinet
minister Haji Mohammad Sanusi. At the heart of the legal
assault
on the opposition were the trials of prominent Islamic and
retired military figures who were vaguely linked by the
government to the Bank Central Asia bombing but whose real
crime
was association with the Petition of Fifty group.
The Petition of Fifty was a petition by former
generals,
political leaders, academicians, students, and others that
was
submitted to the MPR in 1980. The petition accused Suharto
of
using the Pancasila to attack political opponents and to
foster
antidemocratic, one-man rule. The signers of the statement
were
roundly excoriated by Suharto loyalists. The signers
escaped
arrest but were put under tight surveillance and lost many
of
their official perquisites.
Lieutenant General (retired) H.R. Dharsono was the most
prominent of the Petition of Fifty group. After the
Tanjung Priok
affair, Dharsono was arrested because of a position paper
he and
twenty-one others had signed in September 1984,
challenging the
government's version of the affair. According to the
prosecution,
this position paper "undermined the authority of the
government."
Dharsono also was accused of "mental terrorism" for having
made
statements that could cause social unrest, as well as of
associating with persons allegedly involved in the
subsequent
bombings. In an extraordinarily open trial, he was found
guilty
in January 1986 and sentenced to ten years' imprisonment.
Unrepentant, Dharsono was released in the looser
atmosphere of
keterbukaan in September 1990. Clearly, the
Dharsono trial
and others, as well as the social and economic pressures
on
extraparliamentary critics of the government, such as the
Petition of Fifty group, were meant as reminders of the
acceptable boundaries of political comment. As if to drive
the
point home, nine PKI prisoners who had been jailed for
twenty
years were executed in October 1986. Two others were
executed in
1988. These exemplary punishments were warnings against
the
consequences of "left extremism."
The fact that the legal and official regulatory
framework
that stifled opposition for so many years remained intact
required cautious conclusions about keterbukaan.
Although
the dialogue was more open and included more "political"
subjects
in the early 1990s, limits could be quickly and
arbitrarily set
by the government, whose level of tolerance was
unpredictable.
The limits were ambiguous because they tended to be
applied
capriciously. Still, there were indicators that a more
participative political system would evolve in the mid- to
late
1990s. American political scientist R. William Liddle
identified
six characteristics of the Indonesian economy, society,
and
politics that appeared to favor a move in that direction:
growing
dependence on domestic taxes and thus taxpayer approval;
wide
distribution of the benefits of economic growth with
increased
resources for groups to become politically active; greater
connections to the outside world; greater education and
literacy;
more interest in democratization; and an institutionalized
strong
presidency. This last factor ensured that as more
political
voices were heard there would be no return to the
parliamentary
impotency that paralyzed Indonesia in the 1950s. Thus, it
was
argued, democracy and stability could coexist.
Much, of course, would depend upon the succession
scenario.
According to a less sanguine assessment, a more open
political
dialogue could be manipulated by the major actors
positioning
themselves for the succession--ABRI, Islam, bureaucratic
interests, and Golkar. These groups sought support among a
growing middle-class constituency which, intermittently at
least,
was moved by the kinds of issues raised by socially
conscious
nongovernmental organizations and students, as well as
nonestablishment political organizations like the group
that
issued the Petition of Fifty. The succession issue itself,
as
long as it remained unresolved, had the potential of being
a
destablilizing factor. Outside the bureaucratic inner
circle, the
political actors most directly affected by succession
could only
imperfectly transmit their messages about democracy,
equity,
corruption, the environment, and succession to the public
because
the nongovernmental media was subject to the same
constraints as
the other institutions in Pancasila democracy
(see The Media
, this ch.).
Data as of November 1992
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