00074918.2010.522501
Bulletin of Indonesian Economic Studies
ISSN: 0007-4918 (Print) 1472-7234 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/cbie20
Indonesian politics in 2010: the perils of stagnation
Dirk Tomsa
To cite this article: Dirk Tomsa (2010) Indonesian politics in 2010: the perils of stagnation,
Bulletin of Indonesian Economic Studies, 46:3, 309-328, DOI: 10.1080/00074918.2010.522501
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Bulletin of Indonesian Economic Studies, Vol. 46, No. 3, 2010: 309–28
INDONESIAN POLITICS IN 2010:
THE PERILS OF STAGNATION
Dirk Tomsa*
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La Trobe University, Melbourne
In the irst year after President Yudhoyono’s re-election, Indonesian politics continued to evolve in largely familiar patterns. Contrary to the expectations of some
observers, Yudhoyono’s strong popular mandate and his Democratic Party’s newly
won parliamentary plurality did not result in signiicant changes to the president’s
cautious style of governing or the ickle nature of president–parliament relations.
Most political parties also opted for continuity over change, electing or re-electing
established igures as leaders despite high levels of public dissatisfaction with their
performance. The fact that the 2009 election failed to generate any new momentum for reform does not augur well for the remainder of Yudhoyono’s second term.
Although the basic parameters of Indonesia’s democracy remain intact, political
developments during 2010 have also conirmed a pattern of stagnation that is likely
to see Indonesia barely muddle through as a reasonably stable yet low-quality democracy.
INTRODUCTION
When Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (SBY) was sworn in for his second term as
Indonesia’s president in October 2009, speculation abounded among political
observers as to whether his second administration would be any different from
the irst (Sukma 2009). In particular, many commentators wondered if the president would use his strong popular mandate and the newly won parliamentary
plurality of his Democratic Party (Partai Demokrat, PD)1 to re-position himself as
a more resolute political leader. In the previous ive years, Yudhoyono’s administration had often struggled to govern effectively, especially because of the
constant need for the president to secure support from a notoriously restive parliament (Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat, DPR). Apart from weak governance, other
recurring problems such as endemic corruption, poorly institutionalised parties
and the accommodation of powerful elite groups with questionable democratic
* This is a revised version of a paper presented to the 28th Indonesia Update conference,
held at the Australian National University, Canberra, 24–25 September 2010. The author
would like to thank Ed Aspinall, Marcus Mietzner, Ross McLeod and Andreas Ufen for
valuable comments on an earlier draft.
1 SBY won 60.8% of the vote in the irst round of the 2009 presidential election. A few months
earlier, his Democratic Party had emerged victorious in the legislative elections, winning 148
out of 560 seats in parliament (20.9% of the vote); see Sukma (2009) for further details.
ISSN 0007-4918 print/ISSN 1472-7234 online/10/030309-20
DOI: 10.1080/00074918.2010.522501
© 2010 Indonesia Project ANU
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Dirk Tomsa
credentials overshadowed Indonesia’s generally successful maturation into a
stable electoral democracy during the irst Yudhoyono term (Aspinall 2010a;
Tomsa 2010a).
One year into Yudhoyono’s second term there are few signs that much has
changed. As the following overview of political developments in 2010 will show,
relations between the president and the legislature are still somewhat uneasy,
most political parties have done little to address long-standing problems, and
several anti-democratic groups have continued to enjoy impunity despite sometimes blatant human rights violations. This article will illustrate these trends of
broad continuity by analysing a number of key events that shaped Indonesian
politics over the last 12 months. It will be argued that, while the overall stability of the political system is not in jeopardy at this stage, the apparent inertia
among Jakarta elites and their persistent unwillingness to tackle the abovementioned problems do not augur well for the future. Signiicantly, the irst
year of the second Yudhoyono administration has demonstrated that neither
the president himself nor the parties or parliament can be expected to provide
the kind of leadership required for the deepening of Indonesian democracy. The
good news, however, is that civil society groups and the media have responded
to the lack of initiative from Jakarta’s political elite by stepping up their efforts
to expose the country’s various democratic deicits. On balance then, political
developments during 2010 are likely to have set a pattern for the remaining
years of the Yudhoyono presidency that will see Indonesia muddle through as a
stable yet low-quality democracy.
The discussion unfolds in four parts. It begins with a brief recapitulation of
the so-called ‘Bank Century scandal’ and the subsequent parliamentary inquiry
into the case, which contributed to the resignation of one of Yudhoyono’s most
reform-oriented ministers, inance minister Sri Mulyani. After highlighting three
ways in which this incident exempliied the character of Indonesian politics
throughout the year, the article looks at coalition politics and parliament–president relations in the ensuing months, especially after the formation of a joint
coalition secretariat. An examination of the status of Indonesia’s political parties
follows, with particular attention given to the question of leadership succession
that was at the heart of several national party congresses in 2010. Finally, the
analysis focuses on President Yudhoyono himself. Using as examples the Bank
Century affair, the apparent rise of religious intolerance in Indonesia in the last
year and the renewed tensions in Papua in recent months, the article demonstrates that Yudhoyono’s often cautious and indecisive approach to governance
is not always a virtue, but has in fact often exacerbated socio-political conlicts.
CABINET FORMATION, THE BANK CENTURY CASE
AND THE DEMISE OF SRI MULYANI
First indications that continuity rather than change would mark Yudhoyono’s second term in ofice were obvious when the president announced his Second United
Indonesia Cabinet (Kabinet Indonesia Bersatu II) in October 2009. Defying widespread criticism from both the media and academic quarters, Yudhoyono once
again assembled a ‘rainbow’ cabinet, with representatives from no less than six
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Indonesian politics in 2010: the perils of stagnation
311
political parties.2 In addition to his own PD, which was given six ministries, four
Islam-based parties (PKS, PAN, PPP and PKB) and the former Soeharto regime
party Golkar were all awarded positions in a cabinet of 34 members.3
Grand coalitions have become a kind of ‘invented tradition’ in Indonesia during the reform era (Aspinall 2010b: 110). Ever since the short-lived administration of the late Abdurrahman Wahid, Indonesian presidents have sought to win
broad-based support from the country’s fragmented party spectrum by including
as many parties as possible in their cabinets. The often stated and seemingly obvious aim of this strategy has been to ensure smooth relations between the executive and legislative branches of government. Indeed, given that no Indonesian
president in the last 10 years has belonged to a party that held a majority of seats
in the legislature, it appears, at irst sight at least, logical for a president to try
to form such a coalition. However, a cursory glance at the history of president–
parliament relations since 1999 shows that this simple calculation does not apply
in Indonesia. As Sherlock (2009: 342) has explained, Indonesia’s parliament rarely
makes its decisions by vote, but usually operates by consensus, so that ‘having an
overall numerical majority does not necessarily translate into control of decisions
about legislation, appointment of key state oficials and oversight of executive
government spending and policy’. Moreover, cabinet solidarity has always been
low across the party spectrum, regardless of how many parties have been represented in the government (Sherlock 2009; Van Zorge 2010).
It should have come as no surprise, therefore, that SBY’s large coalition began
to crumble as soon as ministers had settled into their ofices. Ostensibly, the tensions that erupted in late 2009 between the president and two of his ‘coalition
partners’, Golkar and PKS, were triggered by alleged irregularities in the bail-out
of a failed bank, Bank Century.4 It soon became clear, however, that a concern
about irregularities was not the real reason why the two parties opposed the bailout and pushed for a parliamentary inquiry into the process. Rather, they saw an
opportunity to settle some old scores with two of SBY’s most trusted aides, the
vice president, Boediono, and the inance minister, Sri Mulyani Indrawati, both of
whom had played key roles in authorising the bail-out.
The Bank Century saga had begun in earnest by mid-November 2009, when
139 legislators from several parties successfully moved to set up a parliamentary inquiry to investigate why the amount of money used in the bail-out
(Rp 6.76 trillion, or $716 million) far exceeded the original estimate endorsed
by parliament.5 Leading forces behind the move were the three ‘opposition’
2 See Diamond (2009) and Sherlock (2009) for two different arguments about why rainbow
cabinets are counterproductive.
3 PKS: Partai Keadilan Sejahtera (Prosperous Justice Party); PAN: Partai Amanat Nasional
(National Mandate Party); PPP: Partai Persatuan Pembangunan (United Development Party); PKB: Partai Kebangkitan Bangsa (National Awakening Party); Golkar: Partai Golongan
Karya (Golkar Party).
4 Selected parts of the following paragraphs on the Bank Century case are taken from
Tomsa (2010b).
5 For more background on the events leading up to the iling of the motion, see Patunru
and Von Luebke (2010) and McLeod (2010).
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Dirk Tomsa
parties, PDI–P, Hanura and Gerindra,6 and ‘coalition members’ Golkar and PKS.
Golkar in particular led the campaign with remarkable vigour. For the former
Soeharto regime party, which had suffered signiicant losses in the 2009 election,
the reformist Sri Mulyani had long been a thorn in the side. Well known for her
tireless efforts to root out graft in her ministry, she had repeatedly clashed with
the Golkar chair and former cabinet minister, Aburizal Bakrie – for example,
over alleged tax evasion in some of Bakrie’s enterprises and his attitude to the
Lapindo mudlow disaster (Baird and Wihardja 2010: 144).7 Thus, after initial
attempts to link President Yudhoyono himself to the extra funds had failed, the
inquiry’s focus soon shifted to Mulyani and Boediono.
Neither denied involvement, but both stressed that they had at all times acted
in accordance with the law.8 As inance minister, Sri Mulyani had chaired the
Committee for Financial System Stability (Komite Stabilitas Sistem Keuangan),
which in November 2008 made the decision to bail out Bank Century when the
bank’s capital adequacy ratio fell well below zero. Boediono, too, was involved
in the process, having then been governor of the central bank, which is responsible for bank supervision. When the parliamentary inquiry committee questioned
them about their roles, Mulyani and Boediono defended their actions by arguing
that, under the circumstances of the global inancial crisis, closing the bank, rather
than injecting new capital so as to bail out its depositors, would have had disastrous consequences for the banking sector.
Inquiry committee members were unmoved though. After a lengthy and very
public series of parliamentary hearings, broadcast live on a Bakrie-owned television channel, the legislators declared the bail-out lawed and marred by corruption and other irregularities. Although no evidence was presented to back
up the corruption claims, a plenary session of the parliament on 3 March 2010,
which according to media observers ‘ranged from boring to farcical’ (Rachman,
Hutapea and Saraswati 2010), endorsed the committee’s indings by concluding
that the Bank Century case was an ‘abuse of power by oficials from the monetary and iscal authorities [...] that could qualify as a suspected act of corruption’
(Wedhaswary 2010a). In addition, the parliament recommended that Mulyani
and Boediono be subjected to further investigation by law enforcement institutions, including the Corruption Eradication Commission (Komisi Pemberantasan Korupsi, KPK).9 Soon afterwards, legislators began to collect signatures
for the initiation of impeachment procedures against Boediono. This, however,
6 PDI–P: Partai Demokrasi Indonesia Perjuangan (Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle); Hanura: Partai Hati Nurani Rakyat (People’s Conscience Party); Gerindra: Partai
Gerakan Rakyat Indonesia Raya (Greater Indonesia Movement Party).
7 For details on the Lapindo mudlow disaster, see Thee and Negara (2010), in this issue.
8 By contrast, the former owner of the bank, Robert Tantular, was convicted in September
2009 of corruption and various banking crimes that contributed to its failure (LaMoshi
2010). His initial four-year prison sentence was later extended to nine years by the Supreme Court.
9 This recommendation was somewhat ironic, not only because most political observers
regard Sri Mulyani as incorruptible, but also because the DPR had previously attempted to
weaken the KPK on a number of occasions, for example, by delaying budget approvals and
by watering down the wording of the 2009 Anti-corruption Court Law.
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Indonesian politics in 2010: the perils of stagnation
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was merely a symbolic act without any real prospect of success, since Indonesia’s
impeachment requirements are now fairly restrictive.10
Unsurprisingly, given the failure of the parliamentary inquiry to present any
evidence of corruption, the impeachment efforts soon izzled out, as did the criminal investigations by the KPK. But the parliamentary inquiry committee did succeed in wearing Sri Mulyani down, and after months of relentless criticism she
eventually resigned on 5 May 2010 to take up a position as a managing director at
the World Bank. The exact circumstances of Mulyani’s resignation remain somewhat unclear. Some observers speculated that she had simply had enough of the
constant criticism and interrogation, and therefore gladly accepted the offer from
the World Bank. Others believed that she was, in effect, ired from the cabinet –
sacriiced, as Emmerson (2010) put it, ‘for the sake of a restoration of political comity between SBY and his opponents’. A third interpretation was that she was in fact
unwilling to resign, but that she miscalculated the support she could expect from
President Yudhoyono. According to this view, Mulyani attempted to use the World
Bank offer to pressure Yudhoyono into backing her publicly against Bakrie and
the parliamentary inquiry. Instead of declaring his unconditional support for her,
the president decided that it was in his best interests to encourage his minister to
accept the offer, and thereby put an end to the Bank Century saga (Cochrane 2010).
Indeed, once Mulyani had announced her resignation, the inquiry swiftly lost
momentum. In particular, Golkar’s interest in it ended as quickly as it had begun.
Within hours of the inance minister’s announcement, leading Golkar politician
Priyo Budi Santoso declared that ‘if Sri Mulyani is out of the political and legal
loop after she resigns, Golkar will respect [this]. Even if the case is closed, Golkar
will have no problem with it’ (Jakarta Globe, 6/5/2010). And so it happened. Even
though law enforcement institutions launched a formal criminal investigation
as requested by the parliamentary inquiry, no evidence of criminal activity was
found, and the case quickly disappeared from view.
The Bank Century saga exempliied in three respects the way Indonesian politics evolved throughout 2010. First, it epitomised the tendency of parliament to
dedicate enormous attention to issues beyond its normal mandate, while neglecting its regular duties of legislation. Second, it demonstrated that stable coalitions will remain elusive in Indonesia as long as parties do not invest in internal
reforms that could see them develop better organisational infrastructure, stronger
programmatic identities and more professional recruitment policies. Third, it
conirmed Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s reputation as a cautious and indecisive
leader who tends to shy away from confrontation unless his own personal interests are affected,11 and whose commitment to reform seems lukewarm at best.
10 According to Law 27/2009 on Legislative Bodies, parliament can only invoke its right
to express an opinion that would pave the way for an impeachment process if it has the
support of three-quarters of legislators at a plenary session. The president’s PD currently
controls 26% of the seats in the DPR.
11 Yudhoyono did, for example, act more decisively when he ensured his enduring inluence in PD by not only maintaining his position as chair of the Advisory Council (Dewan Pembina), but also, and more importantly, becoming chair of the newly created High
Council (Majelis Tinggi), which was given authority to make key decisions such as the
nomination of the party’s presidential candidate in 2014. SBY also demonstrated strength
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In the following paragraphs I will analyse these three patterns of Indonesian politics in more detail, using a number of key events throughout the year to illustrate
how deeply ingrained they are.
THE DAWN OF A NEW ERA?
COALITION POLITICS AND PARLIAMENTARY PERFORMANCE
Just two days after Sri Mulyani’s resignation, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono summoned the members of his coalition to discuss ways to enhance the coherence of
the cabinet. The result of the meeting was the establishment of a ‘joint secretariat’,
whose task it would be to improve communication among the six coalition parties. In an ambitious statement, PD stalwart Anas Urbaningrum (later to become
party chair) announced that the secretariat represented ‘the dawn of a new era of
an organized coalition’ (Sihaloho 2010).
The man to guide the coalition into this new era as chair of the secretariat was
Golkar Party leader Aburizal Bakrie – the very person who had orchestrated the
attack on the senior economic minister in the coalition and who is widely regarded
as a key obstacle to democratic reform in Indonesia. For some observers, Bakrie’s
new position meant that Golkar had not only won the battle against Mulyani but
was also winning the wider struggle for power and inluence in the cabinet. Even
though neither the function of the secretariat nor the role of its chair was particularly well deined, the Golkar leader was likened in some commentaries to a kind
of ‘prime minister’, who was effectively taking over the government.12
While it may be too early for a conclusive judgment, it seems clear that such
rhetoric was very much misplaced. A key part of the problem is that parties in
Indonesia often speak with several voices, since members of parliament tend to
pursue very different interests from their party colleagues in cabinet. As Sherlock
(2010: 174) has observed, ‘the behaviour of […] parties – in this and previous
parliaments – suggests that they will feel little reluctance to criticise the actions of
the government, even though they may be part of the administration themselves’.
The formation of the joint secretariat was supposedly intended to deal with this
problem and provide for more coherence among party lines put forward in parliament and cabinet. So far, however, there is only limited evidence that the patterns
of executive–legislature relations are changing. Nor is there much indication of
a heightened sense of solidarity among the coalition parties within parliament.
Indeed, merely a month after the formation of the secretariat, the coalition
parties and their parliamentary caucuses had again begun to speak with many
voices, arguing either with the government or with each other over a controversial
during recent reshufles in the military when he promoted a number of generals who had
served him in staff positions during his active time in the armed forces. Both moves helped
the president to strengthen his grip over crucial bases of institutional support. However,
they were hardly examples of leadership for the public good. (Thanks to Marcus Mietzner
for his comments on these issues during the discussion of this paper at the Indonesia Update conference.)
12 See, for example, comments by Burhanuddin Muhtadi, a political analyst at the Indonesian Survey Institute, or Ari Dwipayana from Gadjah Mada University (Siahaan 2010;
Unjianto 2010).
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Indonesian politics in 2010: the perils of stagnation
315
pork-barrel fund proposed by the Golkar Party. Shortly afterwards, disagreements
surfaced again over the appropriate attitude towards Malaysia in the now almost
ritualistic annual tensions with Indonesia’s northern neighbour. In both cases
individual coalition parties and at times even individual members of coalition
parties pursued their own agendas and did not shy away from publicly contradicting or criticising each other.
The irst public spat following the formation of the joint secretariat erupted in
early June over a proposal by the Golkar Party to give all DPR members Rp 15 billion ($1.6 million) in development funds for their constituencies (so-called ‘dana
aspirasi’ or ‘aspiration funds’). Reminiscent of Philippine-style pork-barrel politics,
the proposal drew immediate and widespread public criticism, not only because
of its potential for corruption and vote-buying, but also because it violated existing legislation and was seen as an attempt by legislators to interfere in the government’s budget allocation (Transparency International Indonesia 2010).13 To
Golkar’s surprise, coalition partners PD, PKS and PAN soon joined the chorus of
criticism, and the new inance minister, Agus Martowardojo, also made it clear that
he would not support the plan. Taken aback, some Golkar politicians complained
that they had been betrayed by the other parties, claiming that during talks in the
joint secretariat all parties had endorsed the idea (Wedhaswary 2010b). Deputy
chair Yamin Tawari even threatened that Golkar would leave the joint secretariat,
forcing Aburizal Bakrie to intervene and dismiss Tawari’s statement as a personal
opinion. President Yudhoyono, meanwhile, reacted rather late and seemed personally offended by the statement. More than a week afterwards, he expressed
his displeasure by declaring somewhat patronisingly that it was immature (kurang
matang) for coalition members to issue such threats (Widhi K. 2010).
The pork-barrel proposal had barely disappeared from public discussion
when law makers from the coalition parties became embroiled in another public disagreement. Once again it was Golkar that strayed from the coalition line,
this time questioning the appropriateness of the government’s handling of the
latest border dispute with Malaysia. On 13 August 2010, three oficials from the
Indonesian Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries were detained briely by
Malaysian marine police in response to the arrest of seven Malaysian ishers by
Indonesian authorities in disputed waters off the coast of the Riau Archipelago
province. After four days both sides released their detainees, but the incident
had, as on previous such occasions, stirred up nationalist emotions in both countries, and over the following days the Yudhoyono government was repeatedly
accused of having caved in to Malaysia.
PDI–P legislators were particularly outspoken in their criticism, but Golkar,
too, sensed an opportunity to score political points by fanning populist sentiment.
As fringe nationalist groups organised raucous anti-Malaysia protests in Jakarta
13 According to Transparency International Indonesia (2010), the proposal violated no
less than six laws: Law 17/2003 on State Finance; Law 1/2004 on the State Treasury; Law
32/2004 on Regional Government; State Audit Law 15/2004; Law 33/2004 on the Financial
Balance between the Centre and the Regions; and Law 27/2009 on the People’s
People’s ConsultaConsultative Assembly (Majelis Permusyawaratan Rakyat), the DPR, the Regional Representative
Council (Dewan Perwakilan Daerah) and the Regional People’s Representative Councils
(Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat Daerah).
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Dirk Tomsa
and other big cities, several Golkar legislators expressed their support for the parliament to invoke its right to call in the president for questioning (interpelasi, interpellation). On 30 August, party chair Aburizal Bakrie announced that he would
seek clariication from the government about the incident. The following day,
Agus Gumiwang Kartasasmita of Golkar’s parliamentary faction told the press
that all but one of Golkar’s 107 DPR members had agreed to call the government
in for questioning. Other coalition partners, however, refused to toe Golkar’s line.
Left with no support outside his own party, Bakrie eventually changed his stance,
signalling that a speech by President Yudhoyono on the issue had convinced him
that the government was suficiently determined to defend Indonesia’s interests
(Widjaya and Adam 2010).
It seems unlikely though that the president’s speech would have had such an
effect. Indeed, the media quickly speculated that Golkar’s change of heart was
related to an impending cabinet reshufle. This suggestion could be interpreted
in two ways. On the one hand, it could mean that Golkar was rewarded for withdrawing its threat of an interpellation with the prospect of greater inluence in a
soon to be reshufled cabinet. Implicit in this interpretation is the ‘prime minister’
logic and the assumption that Aburizal Bakrie wields enormous leverage over
Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. Alternatively, the suggestion could mean the opposite, namely that the president threatened to axe Golkar members from cabinet
unless the party withdrew its support for the interpellation. Only if and when the
cabinet is indeed reshufled will we know whether either of these interpretations
holds true. There is, however, a distinct third possibility. It is in fact quite likely
that Golkar’s decision to back down was not at all related to the possible cabinet
reshufle, but rather to the party’s failure to mobilise more support for its initiative. After the public relations disaster of the pork-barrel proposal, Bakrie may
have felt that insistence on the interpellation would have left him and his party
exposed to the very real possibility of being singled out as the only coalition member constantly to undermine the coherence of the cabinet. Arguably, for Bakrie, as
leader of a joint secretariat intended to secure coalition solidarity, the risk of being
stigmatised as the only spoiler was too high.
Regardless of the actual motivation for Golkar’s manoeuvres, the Malaysia
row was yet another reminder of how easily Indonesia’s parliament is drawn into
highly unproductive debates. Signiicantly, a consequence of this by now very
familiar bickering between parliament and cabinet and between ostensibly allied
parliamentary factions over issues of questionable importance has been that the
DPR has spent very little time on legislation – supposedly one of its core functions. In the irst 11 months of its term, the new DPR had passed only six laws.
Media reports often linked the poor legislation record to low attendance in plenary sessions (Syofyan 2010), and legislators tried to delect public criticism by
discussing options for improving attendance in plenary sessions. For months,
suggestions such as public naming and shaming, ingerprint scanners and inancial penalties were publicly debated, while DPR members pointed to an internal
working group set up to deal with the attendance question. Empty seats, however, are not the main problem in the parliament. Key decisions about legislation
are being made not in plenary sessions, but rather in the committees away from
public view (Sherlock 2010). Therefore, the DPR’s poor legislation record could
be tackled much more effectively by an overhaul of the opaque decision-making
Indonesian politics in 2010: the perils of stagnation
317
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processes than by forcing legislators to attend plenary sessions. More generally,
what is needed is better selection of candidates and training of legislators, but for
that to occur the political parties would need to get on board, and so far they have
shown little inclination to invest in such measures.
SUCCESSION POLITICS WITHIN POLITICAL PARTIES
The poor performance of parliament and the failure of the joint secretariat to
engender coalition unity should hardly cause surprise. For most of the last 10
years, legislative output has been low, and the parties have time and again demonstrated that they are incapable of forming meaningful coalitions. In the absence
of genuine political values and ideational commitments, it has always been the
pursuit of short-term interests and the need to safeguard access to power that
dictated behavioural patterns among the political parties (Tomsa 2008). While this
has often led to supericial alliances, it has never resulted in genuine and enduring coalitions.
Of course, the lack of visionary ideas is just one of many problems the parties
face. Other frequently mentioned shortcomings include poorly developed organisational infrastructure, neglect of parliamentary obligations, and susceptibility to
corruption and illicit fundraising (Mietzner 2007, 2008; Tomsa 2008; Ufen 2008).
That these issues are not just of concern for academic debates but can have direct
consequences for the parties’ electoral prospects – and thus, by implication, for
their long-term survival – became clear in 2009, when all but one of the six core
parties represented in all post-1998 parliaments lost votes (Tomsa 2010a: 146).
Even those parties that did gain votes largely failed to fulil expectations. PKS,
for example, had hoped to double its 2004 result, but gained less than 1%, while
the only two new parties that succeeded in winning seats in parliament (Gerindra
and Hanura) barely cleared the parliamentary threshold. All in all, PD was arguably the only party that could feel satisied with its result.
Over the last year, most parties had a golden opportunity to demonstrate
publicly that they had heard the voters’ message. Golkar, Hanura, PAN, PDI–P
and PKS, as well as the successful PD, all organised national party congresses
between late 2009 and mid-2010. Given the disappointing election results of most
of these parties, one might have expected that the congresses would become sites
for tense leadership battles and starting points for some serious introspection or
‘soul-searching’, as Mietzner (2009a: 9) suggested with regard to Golkar. In most
cases, however, this was not how the congresses unfolded. To begin with, three
parties (PAN, Hanura and PDI–P) elected their leaders by acclamation rather than
by vote, thereby stymieing any incipient debate about leadership and a change of
direction. While PAN installed party veteran Hatta Rajasa at the helm, Hanura
and PDI–P both re-appointed their incumbent chairs, despite poor party election
results and the fact that their candidates, Wiranto and Megawati Soekarnoputri,
had both been defeated in two successive presidential elections.14
The Golkar and PD congresses, on the other hand, did turn into hotly contested
political battlegrounds after the two incumbent chairs, Jusuf Kalla (Golkar) and
14 To be precise, Wiranto ran only as vice-presidential candidate in 2009; for more details
on the PDI–P congress see Aspinall (2010c).
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Dirk Tomsa
Hadi Utomo (PD), gave early indications that they intended to resign. Given their
leading positions in the current party system, both Golkar and PD are commonly
regarded as attractive organisational vehicles for presidential hopefuls in 2014,
so it was hardly surprising that the two leadership contests attracted high-proile
candidates. By the time the congresses were held, any interest in programmatic
discussions was clearly eclipsed by the high-stakes leadership contests.15 Yet,
despite their similarities in focus, the two congresses were markedly different in
their results. In Golkar, the victory of 63-year-old Aburizal Bakrie represented a
change of personnel, but otherwise signalled broad continuity. Bakrie, like his
predecessors, Jusuf Kalla and Akbar Tandjung, is a product of the New Order, and
he secured his victory primarily because of his immense inancial clout and the
promise of access to government resources. In PD, on the other hand, the election
of 41-year-old Anas Urbaningrum represented not only generational change but
also a message that spending big and proximity to the president are not everything. Barrett (2010) called it ‘a victory for democracy’.
In contrast to all the other Indonesian parties, PKS did not organise its congress
to elect its new leadership team. Instead, the congress, which was held in one of
Jakarta’s most luxurious hotels, was merely a celebratory forum to inaugurate the
members of the new leadership board and to disseminate information about the
party’s future direction. Signiicantly, all key decisions about personnel and policy
directions were made before rather than at the congress (Fealy 2010). As early as
February 2010, eligible party cadres had elected the members of the party’s highest decision-making body, the Religious Advisory Council (Majelis Syuro). The
secretive council, whose members, activities and decision-making procedures are
largely unknown to the public, then appointed the central leadership board and
instructed it to continue with implementation of the party’s controversial moderation process, which aims to transform it from a puritanical Islamist party to a
more open and pluralistic mainstream party (Shihab and Nugroho 2008). To what
extent this decision enjoys the support of the grassroots could not be gauged at
the congress, since there were no open forums for discussion. Anecdotal evidence
seems to suggest, however, that there is at least some discontent with the way the
party bosses are handling the moderation process.16 Furthermore, the stagnant
election result of 2009, and critical analyses by some political observers (Fealy
2010), point to ongoing credibility problems for the party, indicating that PKS will
need to do more than make grand gestures such as holding its national congress
in a Western luxury hotel.
All in all then, the various party congresses held over the last 12 months displayed a clear trend towards continuity rather than change. Most parties have
shied away from initiating efforts to build better organisational infrastructure or
develop sharper ideological proiles. Voters who just last year expressed their dissatisfaction with the parties at the ballot box are unlikely to be impressed with this
failure to change. Indeed, opinion polls published in 2010 indicated that support
for most parties was either stagnating or declining further (LSI 2010). In April
15 According to Barrett (2010), a session to discuss the ideological future of PD at the party’s congress in Bandung attracted very little interest.
16 In particular, the apparent decline in piety and modesty among top cadres has raised
some serious concerns at grassroots level (Fealy 2009).
Indonesian politics in 2010: the perils of stagnation
319
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TABLE 1 Support for Political Parties
(% of respondents)
April
2009
January
2010
April
2010
August
2010
PD (Partai Demokrat, Democratic Party)
21
32
27
27
Golkar (Partai Golongan Karya, Golkar Party)
14
11
11
12
PDI–P (Partai Demokrasi Indonesia Perjuangan,
Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle)
14
12
9
15
PKS (Partai Keadilan Sejahtera, Prosperous Justice Party)
8
3
3
6
PAN (Partai Amanat Nasional, National Mandate Party)
6
3
2
3
PPP (Partai Persatuan Pembangunan, United
Development Party)
5
3
3
4
PKB, Partai Kebangkitan Bangsa (National
Awakening Party)
5
5
4
5
Gerindra, Partai Gerakan Rakyat Indonesia
Raya (Greater Indonesia Movement Party)
5
1
1
2
Hanura, Partai Hati Nurani Rakyat (People’s
Conscience Party)
4
1
1
1
Source: LSI (2010).
2010, one year after the last legislative election, all parties except PD recorded
support levels below their 2009 vote. Four months later, in August 2010, support
for PDI–P had risen six percentage points, to a igure slightly higher than its April
2009 election result, but PD was still the only party with a signiicantly enhanced
support base. The results of successive surveys by the Indonesian Survey Institute
(Lembaga Survei Indonesia, LSI) are presented in table 1.
Although the survey igures show a negative trend for most core parties,17 they
caution against exaggerating the importance of the party congresses. There is, for
example, no evidence of a causal connection between the events at the congresses
and the poor survey results for most parties. On the contrary, despite extensive
media coverage, party congresses appear to have had a negligible impact (if any
at all) on how Indonesians perceive their political parties. This indifference, however, carries an important message for the parties. At a time when their support
is declining, parties could have used their congresses to send a clear message
that they are willing to change. Since none seems to have done so, the electorate
remains as disconnected as ever from the political elite.
17 Many respondents in the 2010 surveys refused to endorse any party, however, and
ticked the ‘I don’t know’ box. There is therefore scope for parties to pick up additional support from these undecided voters at the next election.
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Dirk Tomsa
THE PRESIDENT AS ONLOOKER
Given the less than impressive performance of parties and parliament throughout
the year, the president might have been expected to reap some beneits. Indeed,
Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono remains remarkably popular, with the latest available survey, in August 2010, giving him an approval rating of 66% (LSI 2010). While
this is signiicantly below the lofty 85% he enjoyed at the time of his re-election
in July 2009, the recent igure mirrors his support rate for much of his irst term.
And yet there is a growing feeling among many Indonesians that the president
is losing some of his political appeal. Distinctive features that were already characteristic of his irst term, such as his indecisiveness, his tendency to wafle and
his extreme sensitivity to criticism, have received more intense media scrutiny in
recent months. And while in some cases public condemnation of the president’s
actions (or lack thereof) has been misguided,18 in other instances Yudhoyono’s
overly cautious, hands-off approach has been highly problematic for Indonesia’s
democratic future. Three examples illustrate why.
First, during the Bank Century saga the president’s failure to stand up to
the critics in parliament and vigorously defend his minister and vice president
against spurious charges of wrong-doing weakened efforts to combat corruption
and damaged Indonesia’s international reputation (Allard 2010). During his irst
term, Yudhoyono had made the ight against corruption one of the corner-stones
of his administration. Western commentators might sometimes have exaggerated
the extent and the impact of these efforts, but there can be little doubt that some
gains were achieved and that Yudhoyono beneited from the bold investigations
of the KPK. However, when in late 2009 reactionary forces in the police and parliament began to undermine the authority of the commission, the president stood
idly by and did little to defend the anti-corruption forces.
In many ways, the Bank Century affair was a direct continuation of this pattern.
From the beginning it seemed clear that the allegations against Sri Mulyani and
Boediono were baseless (Patunru and Von Luebke 2010). Yet the crisis dragged on
for months, with Yudhoyono once again watching passively from the palace. The
eventual departure of Mulyani was a major setback for the ight against graft, but
there were wider implications, too. Perhaps most importantly, Golkar’s relentless attacks on arguably the most highly regarded ministers in Yudhoyono’s cabinet laid bare the president’s lawed judgment in having appointed yet another
rainbow cabinet in the belief that accommodating so many parties would ensure
smooth governing. When faced with the irst crisis after his re-election, Yudhoyono had neither the strength nor the determination to confront his opponents,
and instead risked months of political paralysis in the faint hope that a solution
would come his way. In the end, this ‘solution’ came in the form of Mulyani’s
resignation but, as outlined above, her departure and the subsequent formation
of the joint secretariat had, contrary to Yudhoyono’s expectations, relatively little
18 During the diplomatic spat with Malaysia in August, for example, Yudhoyono was accused of being too soft on Indonesia’s neighbour in a speech from military headquarters in
Cilangkap, East Jakarta (Simanjuntak 2010). In this case, the president was right to choose
his words carefully and seek a quiet diplomatic solution, rather than further stir nationalist
emotions on both sides.
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Indonesian politics in 2010: the perils of stagnation
321
impact on the pattern of president–parliament relations and the coherence of the
ruling coalition.
Second, Yudhoyono has failed to demonstrate leadership in relation to the recent
resurgence of religious intolerance and the concurrent debate about the apparent impunity of members of militant religious organisations such as the Islamic
Defenders Front (Front Pembela Islam, FPI), the Forum of the Islamic Community
(Forum Umat Islam, FUI) or the Indonesian Mujahidin Council (Majelis Mujahidin
Indonesia, MMI). According to the Setara Institute for Democracy and Peace, violations of religious freedom rose in the irst half of 2010. Between January and July
2010, the institute documented 28 attacks on Christian churches alone, 10 more than
in the whole of 2009 (Kompas, 27/7/2010). Apart from Christian communities, the
Ahmadiyah sect was also repeatedly targeted by Islamic hard-liners, who regard its
members as heretics. Most of the recorded incidents occurred in West Java and the
Jabodetabek (Jakarta, Bogor, Depok, Tangerang, Bekasi) area. In other incidents of
intolerance, FPI and FUI members attacked homosexuals in Surabaya (26 March),
participants in a trans-gender workshop in Depok (4 May) and attendees at a meeting organised by PDI–P politicians in Banyuwangi (24 June). In the Banyuwangi
case, the attackers alleged that their victims were communists.
Vigilantism in the name of religion is of course not a new phenomenon in
Indonesia. FPI, for example, was founded as early as 1998, and has since developed a notorious reputation for attacks on religious minorities and violent raids
on places of alleged vice such as brothels, gambling halls and even art galleries
(Wilson 2006). Over the years, the group has often acted in collusion with local
politicians and elements within the police and military, so its members have long
enjoyed virtual impunity.
This trend not only continued but was exacerbated in 2010. Perpetrators almost
always escaped punishment, and in several cases police were reported to be present, but did ‘not lift a hand to prevent the hard-liners from using force’ (Arnaz
2010). In the overwhelming majority of cases, no arrests were made. Worse still,
in several instances local politicians actively endorsed, or even ordered, the closure of churches and of mosques run by the Ahmadiyah sect, sometimes apparently with a view to enhancing their Islamic credentials ahead of upcoming local
elections. In late August, the Minister for Religious Affairs, Suryadharma Ali,
weighed into the debate about Ahmadiyah, calling for the sect to be disbanded,
in clear conlict with the constitutional guarantee of freedom of religion. The minister thus directly contradicted his president, who just days before had used a
function commemorating the Descent of the Koran to reiterate that everyone in
Indonesia was free to practise his or her religion.
For President Yudhoyono, the comments by his minister, the general perception
of an increase in religious intolerance and the ongoing impunity of groups like
FPI should be highly embarrassing, and a matter for grave concern. Yudhoyono
likes to highlight Indonesia’s success as a tolerant Islamic democracy at home
and abroad, but apart from occasional appeals to uphold freedom of religion he
has done little to stop the spread of violence. He has, for example, failed to take a
tough stance on violent groups like FPI, and has refrained from holding ministers
like Suryadharma Ali to account for statements that undermine religious freedom. Moreover, he has refused to rescind two controversial ministerial decrees
that have indirectly paved the way for the resurgent attacks in 2010.
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Dirk Tomsa
First, a 2006 decree by the religious affairs and home affairs ministries on the
establishment of houses of worship has provided a feeble justiication for several church closures in West Java. From the start, the controversial decree was
regarded as a potential tool for religious hard-liners seeking to prevent religious
minorities from practising their faith. As Salim (2007: 119–22) observed, the
decree makes it dificult for minorities to build or maintain places of worship,
because a religious community needs to demonstrate support from local residents and a so-called ‘Communication Forum for Religious Harmony’ (a local
consultation body prone to siding with the interests of the majority rather than
upholding religious freedom). Unfortunately, developments in 2010 have vindicated early criticism of the decree. Second, a 2008 inter-ministerial decree on
the Ahmadiyah sect, introduced by the same two ministries and the attorney
general, has, through its vague language, directly contributed to ongoing discrimination against the group. Analysing the ‘semi-ban’, Van Klinken (2008: 369)
wrote that its provision of permission to congregate but not to disseminate, as
well as the subsequent call by ministerial oficials and the Indonesian Ulema
Council (Majelis Ulema Indonesia, MUI) for Muslims to monitor Ahmadiyah’s
compliance with these requirements, were ‘tantamount to oficial acceptance of
vigilante violence’. Two years later, Van Klinken’s words appear prophetic: vigilante violence and ‘blame the victim’ rhetoric have become all too familiar features of the debate about Ahmadiyah. Unsurprisingly, human rights groups have
repeatedly called on President Yudhoyono to rescind the 2008 decree (Human
Rights Watch 2010), but instead he has let his religious affairs minister promote
the idea of an outright ban on the sect.
Developments in Papua provide a third example of presidential indecisiveness
and weak leadership, and their direct consequences for the quality of Indonesia’s
democracy. Even though the government has provided substantial inancial aid
to the troubled province under the special autonomy framework, the underlying
sources of local grievances remain largely unaddressed. In particular, the strong
presence of the military, the continuing growth and inluence of the migrant population, and rampant corruption and misappropriation of funds allocated through
the special autonomy framework have caused increasing local discontent. More
generally, Jakarta’s apparent indifference to conditions in Papua has long generated broad resentment. In late 2009 this indifference came to the fore once again
when the home affairs ministry rejected Decision (Surat Keputusan, SK) 14 by the
Papuan People’s Council (Majelis Rakyat Papua, MRP) to ban non-indigenous
Papuans from running for ofice in local elections. The rejection triggered a series
of demonstrations in Papu
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Indonesian politics in 2010: the perils of stagnation
Dirk Tomsa
To cite this article: Dirk Tomsa (2010) Indonesian politics in 2010: the perils of stagnation,
Bulletin of Indonesian Economic Studies, 46:3, 309-328, DOI: 10.1080/00074918.2010.522501
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Bulletin of Indonesian Economic Studies, Vol. 46, No. 3, 2010: 309–28
INDONESIAN POLITICS IN 2010:
THE PERILS OF STAGNATION
Dirk Tomsa*
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La Trobe University, Melbourne
In the irst year after President Yudhoyono’s re-election, Indonesian politics continued to evolve in largely familiar patterns. Contrary to the expectations of some
observers, Yudhoyono’s strong popular mandate and his Democratic Party’s newly
won parliamentary plurality did not result in signiicant changes to the president’s
cautious style of governing or the ickle nature of president–parliament relations.
Most political parties also opted for continuity over change, electing or re-electing
established igures as leaders despite high levels of public dissatisfaction with their
performance. The fact that the 2009 election failed to generate any new momentum for reform does not augur well for the remainder of Yudhoyono’s second term.
Although the basic parameters of Indonesia’s democracy remain intact, political
developments during 2010 have also conirmed a pattern of stagnation that is likely
to see Indonesia barely muddle through as a reasonably stable yet low-quality democracy.
INTRODUCTION
When Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (SBY) was sworn in for his second term as
Indonesia’s president in October 2009, speculation abounded among political
observers as to whether his second administration would be any different from
the irst (Sukma 2009). In particular, many commentators wondered if the president would use his strong popular mandate and the newly won parliamentary
plurality of his Democratic Party (Partai Demokrat, PD)1 to re-position himself as
a more resolute political leader. In the previous ive years, Yudhoyono’s administration had often struggled to govern effectively, especially because of the
constant need for the president to secure support from a notoriously restive parliament (Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat, DPR). Apart from weak governance, other
recurring problems such as endemic corruption, poorly institutionalised parties
and the accommodation of powerful elite groups with questionable democratic
* This is a revised version of a paper presented to the 28th Indonesia Update conference,
held at the Australian National University, Canberra, 24–25 September 2010. The author
would like to thank Ed Aspinall, Marcus Mietzner, Ross McLeod and Andreas Ufen for
valuable comments on an earlier draft.
1 SBY won 60.8% of the vote in the irst round of the 2009 presidential election. A few months
earlier, his Democratic Party had emerged victorious in the legislative elections, winning 148
out of 560 seats in parliament (20.9% of the vote); see Sukma (2009) for further details.
ISSN 0007-4918 print/ISSN 1472-7234 online/10/030309-20
DOI: 10.1080/00074918.2010.522501
© 2010 Indonesia Project ANU
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Dirk Tomsa
credentials overshadowed Indonesia’s generally successful maturation into a
stable electoral democracy during the irst Yudhoyono term (Aspinall 2010a;
Tomsa 2010a).
One year into Yudhoyono’s second term there are few signs that much has
changed. As the following overview of political developments in 2010 will show,
relations between the president and the legislature are still somewhat uneasy,
most political parties have done little to address long-standing problems, and
several anti-democratic groups have continued to enjoy impunity despite sometimes blatant human rights violations. This article will illustrate these trends of
broad continuity by analysing a number of key events that shaped Indonesian
politics over the last 12 months. It will be argued that, while the overall stability of the political system is not in jeopardy at this stage, the apparent inertia
among Jakarta elites and their persistent unwillingness to tackle the abovementioned problems do not augur well for the future. Signiicantly, the irst
year of the second Yudhoyono administration has demonstrated that neither
the president himself nor the parties or parliament can be expected to provide
the kind of leadership required for the deepening of Indonesian democracy. The
good news, however, is that civil society groups and the media have responded
to the lack of initiative from Jakarta’s political elite by stepping up their efforts
to expose the country’s various democratic deicits. On balance then, political
developments during 2010 are likely to have set a pattern for the remaining
years of the Yudhoyono presidency that will see Indonesia muddle through as a
stable yet low-quality democracy.
The discussion unfolds in four parts. It begins with a brief recapitulation of
the so-called ‘Bank Century scandal’ and the subsequent parliamentary inquiry
into the case, which contributed to the resignation of one of Yudhoyono’s most
reform-oriented ministers, inance minister Sri Mulyani. After highlighting three
ways in which this incident exempliied the character of Indonesian politics
throughout the year, the article looks at coalition politics and parliament–president relations in the ensuing months, especially after the formation of a joint
coalition secretariat. An examination of the status of Indonesia’s political parties
follows, with particular attention given to the question of leadership succession
that was at the heart of several national party congresses in 2010. Finally, the
analysis focuses on President Yudhoyono himself. Using as examples the Bank
Century affair, the apparent rise of religious intolerance in Indonesia in the last
year and the renewed tensions in Papua in recent months, the article demonstrates that Yudhoyono’s often cautious and indecisive approach to governance
is not always a virtue, but has in fact often exacerbated socio-political conlicts.
CABINET FORMATION, THE BANK CENTURY CASE
AND THE DEMISE OF SRI MULYANI
First indications that continuity rather than change would mark Yudhoyono’s second term in ofice were obvious when the president announced his Second United
Indonesia Cabinet (Kabinet Indonesia Bersatu II) in October 2009. Defying widespread criticism from both the media and academic quarters, Yudhoyono once
again assembled a ‘rainbow’ cabinet, with representatives from no less than six
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Indonesian politics in 2010: the perils of stagnation
311
political parties.2 In addition to his own PD, which was given six ministries, four
Islam-based parties (PKS, PAN, PPP and PKB) and the former Soeharto regime
party Golkar were all awarded positions in a cabinet of 34 members.3
Grand coalitions have become a kind of ‘invented tradition’ in Indonesia during the reform era (Aspinall 2010b: 110). Ever since the short-lived administration of the late Abdurrahman Wahid, Indonesian presidents have sought to win
broad-based support from the country’s fragmented party spectrum by including
as many parties as possible in their cabinets. The often stated and seemingly obvious aim of this strategy has been to ensure smooth relations between the executive and legislative branches of government. Indeed, given that no Indonesian
president in the last 10 years has belonged to a party that held a majority of seats
in the legislature, it appears, at irst sight at least, logical for a president to try
to form such a coalition. However, a cursory glance at the history of president–
parliament relations since 1999 shows that this simple calculation does not apply
in Indonesia. As Sherlock (2009: 342) has explained, Indonesia’s parliament rarely
makes its decisions by vote, but usually operates by consensus, so that ‘having an
overall numerical majority does not necessarily translate into control of decisions
about legislation, appointment of key state oficials and oversight of executive
government spending and policy’. Moreover, cabinet solidarity has always been
low across the party spectrum, regardless of how many parties have been represented in the government (Sherlock 2009; Van Zorge 2010).
It should have come as no surprise, therefore, that SBY’s large coalition began
to crumble as soon as ministers had settled into their ofices. Ostensibly, the tensions that erupted in late 2009 between the president and two of his ‘coalition
partners’, Golkar and PKS, were triggered by alleged irregularities in the bail-out
of a failed bank, Bank Century.4 It soon became clear, however, that a concern
about irregularities was not the real reason why the two parties opposed the bailout and pushed for a parliamentary inquiry into the process. Rather, they saw an
opportunity to settle some old scores with two of SBY’s most trusted aides, the
vice president, Boediono, and the inance minister, Sri Mulyani Indrawati, both of
whom had played key roles in authorising the bail-out.
The Bank Century saga had begun in earnest by mid-November 2009, when
139 legislators from several parties successfully moved to set up a parliamentary inquiry to investigate why the amount of money used in the bail-out
(Rp 6.76 trillion, or $716 million) far exceeded the original estimate endorsed
by parliament.5 Leading forces behind the move were the three ‘opposition’
2 See Diamond (2009) and Sherlock (2009) for two different arguments about why rainbow
cabinets are counterproductive.
3 PKS: Partai Keadilan Sejahtera (Prosperous Justice Party); PAN: Partai Amanat Nasional
(National Mandate Party); PPP: Partai Persatuan Pembangunan (United Development Party); PKB: Partai Kebangkitan Bangsa (National Awakening Party); Golkar: Partai Golongan
Karya (Golkar Party).
4 Selected parts of the following paragraphs on the Bank Century case are taken from
Tomsa (2010b).
5 For more background on the events leading up to the iling of the motion, see Patunru
and Von Luebke (2010) and McLeod (2010).
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Dirk Tomsa
parties, PDI–P, Hanura and Gerindra,6 and ‘coalition members’ Golkar and PKS.
Golkar in particular led the campaign with remarkable vigour. For the former
Soeharto regime party, which had suffered signiicant losses in the 2009 election,
the reformist Sri Mulyani had long been a thorn in the side. Well known for her
tireless efforts to root out graft in her ministry, she had repeatedly clashed with
the Golkar chair and former cabinet minister, Aburizal Bakrie – for example,
over alleged tax evasion in some of Bakrie’s enterprises and his attitude to the
Lapindo mudlow disaster (Baird and Wihardja 2010: 144).7 Thus, after initial
attempts to link President Yudhoyono himself to the extra funds had failed, the
inquiry’s focus soon shifted to Mulyani and Boediono.
Neither denied involvement, but both stressed that they had at all times acted
in accordance with the law.8 As inance minister, Sri Mulyani had chaired the
Committee for Financial System Stability (Komite Stabilitas Sistem Keuangan),
which in November 2008 made the decision to bail out Bank Century when the
bank’s capital adequacy ratio fell well below zero. Boediono, too, was involved
in the process, having then been governor of the central bank, which is responsible for bank supervision. When the parliamentary inquiry committee questioned
them about their roles, Mulyani and Boediono defended their actions by arguing
that, under the circumstances of the global inancial crisis, closing the bank, rather
than injecting new capital so as to bail out its depositors, would have had disastrous consequences for the banking sector.
Inquiry committee members were unmoved though. After a lengthy and very
public series of parliamentary hearings, broadcast live on a Bakrie-owned television channel, the legislators declared the bail-out lawed and marred by corruption and other irregularities. Although no evidence was presented to back
up the corruption claims, a plenary session of the parliament on 3 March 2010,
which according to media observers ‘ranged from boring to farcical’ (Rachman,
Hutapea and Saraswati 2010), endorsed the committee’s indings by concluding
that the Bank Century case was an ‘abuse of power by oficials from the monetary and iscal authorities [...] that could qualify as a suspected act of corruption’
(Wedhaswary 2010a). In addition, the parliament recommended that Mulyani
and Boediono be subjected to further investigation by law enforcement institutions, including the Corruption Eradication Commission (Komisi Pemberantasan Korupsi, KPK).9 Soon afterwards, legislators began to collect signatures
for the initiation of impeachment procedures against Boediono. This, however,
6 PDI–P: Partai Demokrasi Indonesia Perjuangan (Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle); Hanura: Partai Hati Nurani Rakyat (People’s Conscience Party); Gerindra: Partai
Gerakan Rakyat Indonesia Raya (Greater Indonesia Movement Party).
7 For details on the Lapindo mudlow disaster, see Thee and Negara (2010), in this issue.
8 By contrast, the former owner of the bank, Robert Tantular, was convicted in September
2009 of corruption and various banking crimes that contributed to its failure (LaMoshi
2010). His initial four-year prison sentence was later extended to nine years by the Supreme Court.
9 This recommendation was somewhat ironic, not only because most political observers
regard Sri Mulyani as incorruptible, but also because the DPR had previously attempted to
weaken the KPK on a number of occasions, for example, by delaying budget approvals and
by watering down the wording of the 2009 Anti-corruption Court Law.
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Indonesian politics in 2010: the perils of stagnation
313
was merely a symbolic act without any real prospect of success, since Indonesia’s
impeachment requirements are now fairly restrictive.10
Unsurprisingly, given the failure of the parliamentary inquiry to present any
evidence of corruption, the impeachment efforts soon izzled out, as did the criminal investigations by the KPK. But the parliamentary inquiry committee did succeed in wearing Sri Mulyani down, and after months of relentless criticism she
eventually resigned on 5 May 2010 to take up a position as a managing director at
the World Bank. The exact circumstances of Mulyani’s resignation remain somewhat unclear. Some observers speculated that she had simply had enough of the
constant criticism and interrogation, and therefore gladly accepted the offer from
the World Bank. Others believed that she was, in effect, ired from the cabinet –
sacriiced, as Emmerson (2010) put it, ‘for the sake of a restoration of political comity between SBY and his opponents’. A third interpretation was that she was in fact
unwilling to resign, but that she miscalculated the support she could expect from
President Yudhoyono. According to this view, Mulyani attempted to use the World
Bank offer to pressure Yudhoyono into backing her publicly against Bakrie and
the parliamentary inquiry. Instead of declaring his unconditional support for her,
the president decided that it was in his best interests to encourage his minister to
accept the offer, and thereby put an end to the Bank Century saga (Cochrane 2010).
Indeed, once Mulyani had announced her resignation, the inquiry swiftly lost
momentum. In particular, Golkar’s interest in it ended as quickly as it had begun.
Within hours of the inance minister’s announcement, leading Golkar politician
Priyo Budi Santoso declared that ‘if Sri Mulyani is out of the political and legal
loop after she resigns, Golkar will respect [this]. Even if the case is closed, Golkar
will have no problem with it’ (Jakarta Globe, 6/5/2010). And so it happened. Even
though law enforcement institutions launched a formal criminal investigation
as requested by the parliamentary inquiry, no evidence of criminal activity was
found, and the case quickly disappeared from view.
The Bank Century saga exempliied in three respects the way Indonesian politics evolved throughout 2010. First, it epitomised the tendency of parliament to
dedicate enormous attention to issues beyond its normal mandate, while neglecting its regular duties of legislation. Second, it demonstrated that stable coalitions will remain elusive in Indonesia as long as parties do not invest in internal
reforms that could see them develop better organisational infrastructure, stronger
programmatic identities and more professional recruitment policies. Third, it
conirmed Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s reputation as a cautious and indecisive
leader who tends to shy away from confrontation unless his own personal interests are affected,11 and whose commitment to reform seems lukewarm at best.
10 According to Law 27/2009 on Legislative Bodies, parliament can only invoke its right
to express an opinion that would pave the way for an impeachment process if it has the
support of three-quarters of legislators at a plenary session. The president’s PD currently
controls 26% of the seats in the DPR.
11 Yudhoyono did, for example, act more decisively when he ensured his enduring inluence in PD by not only maintaining his position as chair of the Advisory Council (Dewan Pembina), but also, and more importantly, becoming chair of the newly created High
Council (Majelis Tinggi), which was given authority to make key decisions such as the
nomination of the party’s presidential candidate in 2014. SBY also demonstrated strength
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In the following paragraphs I will analyse these three patterns of Indonesian politics in more detail, using a number of key events throughout the year to illustrate
how deeply ingrained they are.
THE DAWN OF A NEW ERA?
COALITION POLITICS AND PARLIAMENTARY PERFORMANCE
Just two days after Sri Mulyani’s resignation, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono summoned the members of his coalition to discuss ways to enhance the coherence of
the cabinet. The result of the meeting was the establishment of a ‘joint secretariat’,
whose task it would be to improve communication among the six coalition parties. In an ambitious statement, PD stalwart Anas Urbaningrum (later to become
party chair) announced that the secretariat represented ‘the dawn of a new era of
an organized coalition’ (Sihaloho 2010).
The man to guide the coalition into this new era as chair of the secretariat was
Golkar Party leader Aburizal Bakrie – the very person who had orchestrated the
attack on the senior economic minister in the coalition and who is widely regarded
as a key obstacle to democratic reform in Indonesia. For some observers, Bakrie’s
new position meant that Golkar had not only won the battle against Mulyani but
was also winning the wider struggle for power and inluence in the cabinet. Even
though neither the function of the secretariat nor the role of its chair was particularly well deined, the Golkar leader was likened in some commentaries to a kind
of ‘prime minister’, who was effectively taking over the government.12
While it may be too early for a conclusive judgment, it seems clear that such
rhetoric was very much misplaced. A key part of the problem is that parties in
Indonesia often speak with several voices, since members of parliament tend to
pursue very different interests from their party colleagues in cabinet. As Sherlock
(2010: 174) has observed, ‘the behaviour of […] parties – in this and previous
parliaments – suggests that they will feel little reluctance to criticise the actions of
the government, even though they may be part of the administration themselves’.
The formation of the joint secretariat was supposedly intended to deal with this
problem and provide for more coherence among party lines put forward in parliament and cabinet. So far, however, there is only limited evidence that the patterns
of executive–legislature relations are changing. Nor is there much indication of
a heightened sense of solidarity among the coalition parties within parliament.
Indeed, merely a month after the formation of the secretariat, the coalition
parties and their parliamentary caucuses had again begun to speak with many
voices, arguing either with the government or with each other over a controversial
during recent reshufles in the military when he promoted a number of generals who had
served him in staff positions during his active time in the armed forces. Both moves helped
the president to strengthen his grip over crucial bases of institutional support. However,
they were hardly examples of leadership for the public good. (Thanks to Marcus Mietzner
for his comments on these issues during the discussion of this paper at the Indonesia Update conference.)
12 See, for example, comments by Burhanuddin Muhtadi, a political analyst at the Indonesian Survey Institute, or Ari Dwipayana from Gadjah Mada University (Siahaan 2010;
Unjianto 2010).
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315
pork-barrel fund proposed by the Golkar Party. Shortly afterwards, disagreements
surfaced again over the appropriate attitude towards Malaysia in the now almost
ritualistic annual tensions with Indonesia’s northern neighbour. In both cases
individual coalition parties and at times even individual members of coalition
parties pursued their own agendas and did not shy away from publicly contradicting or criticising each other.
The irst public spat following the formation of the joint secretariat erupted in
early June over a proposal by the Golkar Party to give all DPR members Rp 15 billion ($1.6 million) in development funds for their constituencies (so-called ‘dana
aspirasi’ or ‘aspiration funds’). Reminiscent of Philippine-style pork-barrel politics,
the proposal drew immediate and widespread public criticism, not only because
of its potential for corruption and vote-buying, but also because it violated existing legislation and was seen as an attempt by legislators to interfere in the government’s budget allocation (Transparency International Indonesia 2010).13 To
Golkar’s surprise, coalition partners PD, PKS and PAN soon joined the chorus of
criticism, and the new inance minister, Agus Martowardojo, also made it clear that
he would not support the plan. Taken aback, some Golkar politicians complained
that they had been betrayed by the other parties, claiming that during talks in the
joint secretariat all parties had endorsed the idea (Wedhaswary 2010b). Deputy
chair Yamin Tawari even threatened that Golkar would leave the joint secretariat,
forcing Aburizal Bakrie to intervene and dismiss Tawari’s statement as a personal
opinion. President Yudhoyono, meanwhile, reacted rather late and seemed personally offended by the statement. More than a week afterwards, he expressed
his displeasure by declaring somewhat patronisingly that it was immature (kurang
matang) for coalition members to issue such threats (Widhi K. 2010).
The pork-barrel proposal had barely disappeared from public discussion
when law makers from the coalition parties became embroiled in another public disagreement. Once again it was Golkar that strayed from the coalition line,
this time questioning the appropriateness of the government’s handling of the
latest border dispute with Malaysia. On 13 August 2010, three oficials from the
Indonesian Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries were detained briely by
Malaysian marine police in response to the arrest of seven Malaysian ishers by
Indonesian authorities in disputed waters off the coast of the Riau Archipelago
province. After four days both sides released their detainees, but the incident
had, as on previous such occasions, stirred up nationalist emotions in both countries, and over the following days the Yudhoyono government was repeatedly
accused of having caved in to Malaysia.
PDI–P legislators were particularly outspoken in their criticism, but Golkar,
too, sensed an opportunity to score political points by fanning populist sentiment.
As fringe nationalist groups organised raucous anti-Malaysia protests in Jakarta
13 According to Transparency International Indonesia (2010), the proposal violated no
less than six laws: Law 17/2003 on State Finance; Law 1/2004 on the State Treasury; Law
32/2004 on Regional Government; State Audit Law 15/2004; Law 33/2004 on the Financial
Balance between the Centre and the Regions; and Law 27/2009 on the People’s
People’s ConsultaConsultative Assembly (Majelis Permusyawaratan Rakyat), the DPR, the Regional Representative
Council (Dewan Perwakilan Daerah) and the Regional People’s Representative Councils
(Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat Daerah).
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Dirk Tomsa
and other big cities, several Golkar legislators expressed their support for the parliament to invoke its right to call in the president for questioning (interpelasi, interpellation). On 30 August, party chair Aburizal Bakrie announced that he would
seek clariication from the government about the incident. The following day,
Agus Gumiwang Kartasasmita of Golkar’s parliamentary faction told the press
that all but one of Golkar’s 107 DPR members had agreed to call the government
in for questioning. Other coalition partners, however, refused to toe Golkar’s line.
Left with no support outside his own party, Bakrie eventually changed his stance,
signalling that a speech by President Yudhoyono on the issue had convinced him
that the government was suficiently determined to defend Indonesia’s interests
(Widjaya and Adam 2010).
It seems unlikely though that the president’s speech would have had such an
effect. Indeed, the media quickly speculated that Golkar’s change of heart was
related to an impending cabinet reshufle. This suggestion could be interpreted
in two ways. On the one hand, it could mean that Golkar was rewarded for withdrawing its threat of an interpellation with the prospect of greater inluence in a
soon to be reshufled cabinet. Implicit in this interpretation is the ‘prime minister’
logic and the assumption that Aburizal Bakrie wields enormous leverage over
Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. Alternatively, the suggestion could mean the opposite, namely that the president threatened to axe Golkar members from cabinet
unless the party withdrew its support for the interpellation. Only if and when the
cabinet is indeed reshufled will we know whether either of these interpretations
holds true. There is, however, a distinct third possibility. It is in fact quite likely
that Golkar’s decision to back down was not at all related to the possible cabinet
reshufle, but rather to the party’s failure to mobilise more support for its initiative. After the public relations disaster of the pork-barrel proposal, Bakrie may
have felt that insistence on the interpellation would have left him and his party
exposed to the very real possibility of being singled out as the only coalition member constantly to undermine the coherence of the cabinet. Arguably, for Bakrie, as
leader of a joint secretariat intended to secure coalition solidarity, the risk of being
stigmatised as the only spoiler was too high.
Regardless of the actual motivation for Golkar’s manoeuvres, the Malaysia
row was yet another reminder of how easily Indonesia’s parliament is drawn into
highly unproductive debates. Signiicantly, a consequence of this by now very
familiar bickering between parliament and cabinet and between ostensibly allied
parliamentary factions over issues of questionable importance has been that the
DPR has spent very little time on legislation – supposedly one of its core functions. In the irst 11 months of its term, the new DPR had passed only six laws.
Media reports often linked the poor legislation record to low attendance in plenary sessions (Syofyan 2010), and legislators tried to delect public criticism by
discussing options for improving attendance in plenary sessions. For months,
suggestions such as public naming and shaming, ingerprint scanners and inancial penalties were publicly debated, while DPR members pointed to an internal
working group set up to deal with the attendance question. Empty seats, however, are not the main problem in the parliament. Key decisions about legislation
are being made not in plenary sessions, but rather in the committees away from
public view (Sherlock 2010). Therefore, the DPR’s poor legislation record could
be tackled much more effectively by an overhaul of the opaque decision-making
Indonesian politics in 2010: the perils of stagnation
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processes than by forcing legislators to attend plenary sessions. More generally,
what is needed is better selection of candidates and training of legislators, but for
that to occur the political parties would need to get on board, and so far they have
shown little inclination to invest in such measures.
SUCCESSION POLITICS WITHIN POLITICAL PARTIES
The poor performance of parliament and the failure of the joint secretariat to
engender coalition unity should hardly cause surprise. For most of the last 10
years, legislative output has been low, and the parties have time and again demonstrated that they are incapable of forming meaningful coalitions. In the absence
of genuine political values and ideational commitments, it has always been the
pursuit of short-term interests and the need to safeguard access to power that
dictated behavioural patterns among the political parties (Tomsa 2008). While this
has often led to supericial alliances, it has never resulted in genuine and enduring coalitions.
Of course, the lack of visionary ideas is just one of many problems the parties
face. Other frequently mentioned shortcomings include poorly developed organisational infrastructure, neglect of parliamentary obligations, and susceptibility to
corruption and illicit fundraising (Mietzner 2007, 2008; Tomsa 2008; Ufen 2008).
That these issues are not just of concern for academic debates but can have direct
consequences for the parties’ electoral prospects – and thus, by implication, for
their long-term survival – became clear in 2009, when all but one of the six core
parties represented in all post-1998 parliaments lost votes (Tomsa 2010a: 146).
Even those parties that did gain votes largely failed to fulil expectations. PKS,
for example, had hoped to double its 2004 result, but gained less than 1%, while
the only two new parties that succeeded in winning seats in parliament (Gerindra
and Hanura) barely cleared the parliamentary threshold. All in all, PD was arguably the only party that could feel satisied with its result.
Over the last year, most parties had a golden opportunity to demonstrate
publicly that they had heard the voters’ message. Golkar, Hanura, PAN, PDI–P
and PKS, as well as the successful PD, all organised national party congresses
between late 2009 and mid-2010. Given the disappointing election results of most
of these parties, one might have expected that the congresses would become sites
for tense leadership battles and starting points for some serious introspection or
‘soul-searching’, as Mietzner (2009a: 9) suggested with regard to Golkar. In most
cases, however, this was not how the congresses unfolded. To begin with, three
parties (PAN, Hanura and PDI–P) elected their leaders by acclamation rather than
by vote, thereby stymieing any incipient debate about leadership and a change of
direction. While PAN installed party veteran Hatta Rajasa at the helm, Hanura
and PDI–P both re-appointed their incumbent chairs, despite poor party election
results and the fact that their candidates, Wiranto and Megawati Soekarnoputri,
had both been defeated in two successive presidential elections.14
The Golkar and PD congresses, on the other hand, did turn into hotly contested
political battlegrounds after the two incumbent chairs, Jusuf Kalla (Golkar) and
14 To be precise, Wiranto ran only as vice-presidential candidate in 2009; for more details
on the PDI–P congress see Aspinall (2010c).
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Dirk Tomsa
Hadi Utomo (PD), gave early indications that they intended to resign. Given their
leading positions in the current party system, both Golkar and PD are commonly
regarded as attractive organisational vehicles for presidential hopefuls in 2014,
so it was hardly surprising that the two leadership contests attracted high-proile
candidates. By the time the congresses were held, any interest in programmatic
discussions was clearly eclipsed by the high-stakes leadership contests.15 Yet,
despite their similarities in focus, the two congresses were markedly different in
their results. In Golkar, the victory of 63-year-old Aburizal Bakrie represented a
change of personnel, but otherwise signalled broad continuity. Bakrie, like his
predecessors, Jusuf Kalla and Akbar Tandjung, is a product of the New Order, and
he secured his victory primarily because of his immense inancial clout and the
promise of access to government resources. In PD, on the other hand, the election
of 41-year-old Anas Urbaningrum represented not only generational change but
also a message that spending big and proximity to the president are not everything. Barrett (2010) called it ‘a victory for democracy’.
In contrast to all the other Indonesian parties, PKS did not organise its congress
to elect its new leadership team. Instead, the congress, which was held in one of
Jakarta’s most luxurious hotels, was merely a celebratory forum to inaugurate the
members of the new leadership board and to disseminate information about the
party’s future direction. Signiicantly, all key decisions about personnel and policy
directions were made before rather than at the congress (Fealy 2010). As early as
February 2010, eligible party cadres had elected the members of the party’s highest decision-making body, the Religious Advisory Council (Majelis Syuro). The
secretive council, whose members, activities and decision-making procedures are
largely unknown to the public, then appointed the central leadership board and
instructed it to continue with implementation of the party’s controversial moderation process, which aims to transform it from a puritanical Islamist party to a
more open and pluralistic mainstream party (Shihab and Nugroho 2008). To what
extent this decision enjoys the support of the grassroots could not be gauged at
the congress, since there were no open forums for discussion. Anecdotal evidence
seems to suggest, however, that there is at least some discontent with the way the
party bosses are handling the moderation process.16 Furthermore, the stagnant
election result of 2009, and critical analyses by some political observers (Fealy
2010), point to ongoing credibility problems for the party, indicating that PKS will
need to do more than make grand gestures such as holding its national congress
in a Western luxury hotel.
All in all then, the various party congresses held over the last 12 months displayed a clear trend towards continuity rather than change. Most parties have
shied away from initiating efforts to build better organisational infrastructure or
develop sharper ideological proiles. Voters who just last year expressed their dissatisfaction with the parties at the ballot box are unlikely to be impressed with this
failure to change. Indeed, opinion polls published in 2010 indicated that support
for most parties was either stagnating or declining further (LSI 2010). In April
15 According to Barrett (2010), a session to discuss the ideological future of PD at the party’s congress in Bandung attracted very little interest.
16 In particular, the apparent decline in piety and modesty among top cadres has raised
some serious concerns at grassroots level (Fealy 2009).
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TABLE 1 Support for Political Parties
(% of respondents)
April
2009
January
2010
April
2010
August
2010
PD (Partai Demokrat, Democratic Party)
21
32
27
27
Golkar (Partai Golongan Karya, Golkar Party)
14
11
11
12
PDI–P (Partai Demokrasi Indonesia Perjuangan,
Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle)
14
12
9
15
PKS (Partai Keadilan Sejahtera, Prosperous Justice Party)
8
3
3
6
PAN (Partai Amanat Nasional, National Mandate Party)
6
3
2
3
PPP (Partai Persatuan Pembangunan, United
Development Party)
5
3
3
4
PKB, Partai Kebangkitan Bangsa (National
Awakening Party)
5
5
4
5
Gerindra, Partai Gerakan Rakyat Indonesia
Raya (Greater Indonesia Movement Party)
5
1
1
2
Hanura, Partai Hati Nurani Rakyat (People’s
Conscience Party)
4
1
1
1
Source: LSI (2010).
2010, one year after the last legislative election, all parties except PD recorded
support levels below their 2009 vote. Four months later, in August 2010, support
for PDI–P had risen six percentage points, to a igure slightly higher than its April
2009 election result, but PD was still the only party with a signiicantly enhanced
support base. The results of successive surveys by the Indonesian Survey Institute
(Lembaga Survei Indonesia, LSI) are presented in table 1.
Although the survey igures show a negative trend for most core parties,17 they
caution against exaggerating the importance of the party congresses. There is, for
example, no evidence of a causal connection between the events at the congresses
and the poor survey results for most parties. On the contrary, despite extensive
media coverage, party congresses appear to have had a negligible impact (if any
at all) on how Indonesians perceive their political parties. This indifference, however, carries an important message for the parties. At a time when their support
is declining, parties could have used their congresses to send a clear message
that they are willing to change. Since none seems to have done so, the electorate
remains as disconnected as ever from the political elite.
17 Many respondents in the 2010 surveys refused to endorse any party, however, and
ticked the ‘I don’t know’ box. There is therefore scope for parties to pick up additional support from these undecided voters at the next election.
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THE PRESIDENT AS ONLOOKER
Given the less than impressive performance of parties and parliament throughout
the year, the president might have been expected to reap some beneits. Indeed,
Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono remains remarkably popular, with the latest available survey, in August 2010, giving him an approval rating of 66% (LSI 2010). While
this is signiicantly below the lofty 85% he enjoyed at the time of his re-election
in July 2009, the recent igure mirrors his support rate for much of his irst term.
And yet there is a growing feeling among many Indonesians that the president
is losing some of his political appeal. Distinctive features that were already characteristic of his irst term, such as his indecisiveness, his tendency to wafle and
his extreme sensitivity to criticism, have received more intense media scrutiny in
recent months. And while in some cases public condemnation of the president’s
actions (or lack thereof) has been misguided,18 in other instances Yudhoyono’s
overly cautious, hands-off approach has been highly problematic for Indonesia’s
democratic future. Three examples illustrate why.
First, during the Bank Century saga the president’s failure to stand up to
the critics in parliament and vigorously defend his minister and vice president
against spurious charges of wrong-doing weakened efforts to combat corruption
and damaged Indonesia’s international reputation (Allard 2010). During his irst
term, Yudhoyono had made the ight against corruption one of the corner-stones
of his administration. Western commentators might sometimes have exaggerated
the extent and the impact of these efforts, but there can be little doubt that some
gains were achieved and that Yudhoyono beneited from the bold investigations
of the KPK. However, when in late 2009 reactionary forces in the police and parliament began to undermine the authority of the commission, the president stood
idly by and did little to defend the anti-corruption forces.
In many ways, the Bank Century affair was a direct continuation of this pattern.
From the beginning it seemed clear that the allegations against Sri Mulyani and
Boediono were baseless (Patunru and Von Luebke 2010). Yet the crisis dragged on
for months, with Yudhoyono once again watching passively from the palace. The
eventual departure of Mulyani was a major setback for the ight against graft, but
there were wider implications, too. Perhaps most importantly, Golkar’s relentless attacks on arguably the most highly regarded ministers in Yudhoyono’s cabinet laid bare the president’s lawed judgment in having appointed yet another
rainbow cabinet in the belief that accommodating so many parties would ensure
smooth governing. When faced with the irst crisis after his re-election, Yudhoyono had neither the strength nor the determination to confront his opponents,
and instead risked months of political paralysis in the faint hope that a solution
would come his way. In the end, this ‘solution’ came in the form of Mulyani’s
resignation but, as outlined above, her departure and the subsequent formation
of the joint secretariat had, contrary to Yudhoyono’s expectations, relatively little
18 During the diplomatic spat with Malaysia in August, for example, Yudhoyono was accused of being too soft on Indonesia’s neighbour in a speech from military headquarters in
Cilangkap, East Jakarta (Simanjuntak 2010). In this case, the president was right to choose
his words carefully and seek a quiet diplomatic solution, rather than further stir nationalist
emotions on both sides.
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321
impact on the pattern of president–parliament relations and the coherence of the
ruling coalition.
Second, Yudhoyono has failed to demonstrate leadership in relation to the recent
resurgence of religious intolerance and the concurrent debate about the apparent impunity of members of militant religious organisations such as the Islamic
Defenders Front (Front Pembela Islam, FPI), the Forum of the Islamic Community
(Forum Umat Islam, FUI) or the Indonesian Mujahidin Council (Majelis Mujahidin
Indonesia, MMI). According to the Setara Institute for Democracy and Peace, violations of religious freedom rose in the irst half of 2010. Between January and July
2010, the institute documented 28 attacks on Christian churches alone, 10 more than
in the whole of 2009 (Kompas, 27/7/2010). Apart from Christian communities, the
Ahmadiyah sect was also repeatedly targeted by Islamic hard-liners, who regard its
members as heretics. Most of the recorded incidents occurred in West Java and the
Jabodetabek (Jakarta, Bogor, Depok, Tangerang, Bekasi) area. In other incidents of
intolerance, FPI and FUI members attacked homosexuals in Surabaya (26 March),
participants in a trans-gender workshop in Depok (4 May) and attendees at a meeting organised by PDI–P politicians in Banyuwangi (24 June). In the Banyuwangi
case, the attackers alleged that their victims were communists.
Vigilantism in the name of religion is of course not a new phenomenon in
Indonesia. FPI, for example, was founded as early as 1998, and has since developed a notorious reputation for attacks on religious minorities and violent raids
on places of alleged vice such as brothels, gambling halls and even art galleries
(Wilson 2006). Over the years, the group has often acted in collusion with local
politicians and elements within the police and military, so its members have long
enjoyed virtual impunity.
This trend not only continued but was exacerbated in 2010. Perpetrators almost
always escaped punishment, and in several cases police were reported to be present, but did ‘not lift a hand to prevent the hard-liners from using force’ (Arnaz
2010). In the overwhelming majority of cases, no arrests were made. Worse still,
in several instances local politicians actively endorsed, or even ordered, the closure of churches and of mosques run by the Ahmadiyah sect, sometimes apparently with a view to enhancing their Islamic credentials ahead of upcoming local
elections. In late August, the Minister for Religious Affairs, Suryadharma Ali,
weighed into the debate about Ahmadiyah, calling for the sect to be disbanded,
in clear conlict with the constitutional guarantee of freedom of religion. The minister thus directly contradicted his president, who just days before had used a
function commemorating the Descent of the Koran to reiterate that everyone in
Indonesia was free to practise his or her religion.
For President Yudhoyono, the comments by his minister, the general perception
of an increase in religious intolerance and the ongoing impunity of groups like
FPI should be highly embarrassing, and a matter for grave concern. Yudhoyono
likes to highlight Indonesia’s success as a tolerant Islamic democracy at home
and abroad, but apart from occasional appeals to uphold freedom of religion he
has done little to stop the spread of violence. He has, for example, failed to take a
tough stance on violent groups like FPI, and has refrained from holding ministers
like Suryadharma Ali to account for statements that undermine religious freedom. Moreover, he has refused to rescind two controversial ministerial decrees
that have indirectly paved the way for the resurgent attacks in 2010.
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First, a 2006 decree by the religious affairs and home affairs ministries on the
establishment of houses of worship has provided a feeble justiication for several church closures in West Java. From the start, the controversial decree was
regarded as a potential tool for religious hard-liners seeking to prevent religious
minorities from practising their faith. As Salim (2007: 119–22) observed, the
decree makes it dificult for minorities to build or maintain places of worship,
because a religious community needs to demonstrate support from local residents and a so-called ‘Communication Forum for Religious Harmony’ (a local
consultation body prone to siding with the interests of the majority rather than
upholding religious freedom). Unfortunately, developments in 2010 have vindicated early criticism of the decree. Second, a 2008 inter-ministerial decree on
the Ahmadiyah sect, introduced by the same two ministries and the attorney
general, has, through its vague language, directly contributed to ongoing discrimination against the group. Analysing the ‘semi-ban’, Van Klinken (2008: 369)
wrote that its provision of permission to congregate but not to disseminate, as
well as the subsequent call by ministerial oficials and the Indonesian Ulema
Council (Majelis Ulema Indonesia, MUI) for Muslims to monitor Ahmadiyah’s
compliance with these requirements, were ‘tantamount to oficial acceptance of
vigilante violence’. Two years later, Van Klinken’s words appear prophetic: vigilante violence and ‘blame the victim’ rhetoric have become all too familiar features of the debate about Ahmadiyah. Unsurprisingly, human rights groups have
repeatedly called on President Yudhoyono to rescind the 2008 decree (Human
Rights Watch 2010), but instead he has let his religious affairs minister promote
the idea of an outright ban on the sect.
Developments in Papua provide a third example of presidential indecisiveness
and weak leadership, and their direct consequences for the quality of Indonesia’s
democracy. Even though the government has provided substantial inancial aid
to the troubled province under the special autonomy framework, the underlying
sources of local grievances remain largely unaddressed. In particular, the strong
presence of the military, the continuing growth and inluence of the migrant population, and rampant corruption and misappropriation of funds allocated through
the special autonomy framework have caused increasing local discontent. More
generally, Jakarta’s apparent indifference to conditions in Papua has long generated broad resentment. In late 2009 this indifference came to the fore once again
when the home affairs ministry rejected Decision (Surat Keputusan, SK) 14 by the
Papuan People’s Council (Majelis Rakyat Papua, MRP) to ban non-indigenous
Papuans from running for ofice in local elections. The rejection triggered a series
of demonstrations in Papu