Parliament on 28 January approved the legal foundation that will govern the new political party system and the ‘99 election. A complete draft of the law had not yet emerged by mid-February. Here we note some points crucial for the outcome and credibility of the election.
Jim Schiller
Political Parties
With over 140 parties there will be clashes over who has the right to use similar names and symbols.
To be eligible to participate, parties must have executive boards in 9 (out of 27) provinces, and in half the towns and districts in each of those provinces.
New parties will need at least 10 seats in the national assembly to stand at the 2004 election.
An advisory team of 11 reputable individuals headed by Dr Nurcholish Madjid has been appointed to consider applications by the 140+ political parties to compete.
Candidates will be elected proportionally by province (thus not on a district basis as initially envisaged), but a party's winning candidates will be chosen on the basis of district results.
Managing the election
Election committees (KPU) at various levels will manage the campaign and election. All parties are represented, but government retains 50% of the votes. This is an improvement. However, some party seats will go to Golkar, so the government is likely to have a majority.
Independent Indonesian and international observers will be permitted to monitor the election. Management of the election will be more transparent than ever before. The risk of getting caught for those tempted to intimidate voters will be far greater.
The armed forces
The number of unelected Abri seats in the People’s Consultative Assembly MPR (super-parliament) has been reduced from 75 to 38. But this could still make the armed forces the 5th or 6th biggest faction in the MPR! In provincial and local assemblies they have been reduced to 10% of the seats.
Civil service
Parliament could not agree on whether civil servants should be politically neutral. The government then issued a compromise regulation, one it modified two days later. The regulation allows civil servants to vote and, provided they take leave from office, to join political parties. The revised regulation allows for one year of leave on basic pay. However, the ‘neutrality’ of the civil service can still be easily circumvented. Local civil servants could have their spouses or children run for office, or just take leave and accept payment from Golkar or other parties to make up for salary loss.
Electing the president
The new MPR will have 700 seats (old MPR 1000).
238 Seats will be appointed (old MPR 575), including 38 military, 135 regional and 65 group representatives.
Two big questions remain. Who will choose the 65 group representatives - newly elected national and local assemblies, or the present Golkar and army controlled assemblies? The law says they will be decided by the groups themselves! By what procedure will the new MPR elect the president? For example, if there are many candidates, will the candidate with the most votes win, or will a 50% + 1 majority be required?
Provincial and local elections
Local politics has the best prospects for empowering ordinary Indonesians and for giving the election credibility. Provincial and local assemblies will be elected at the same time as national assemblies, but there has been almost no public debate on how this will happen.
Inside Indonesia 58: Apr-Jun 1999
58: Off to the polls
April - June 1999
Politics and human rights
Off to the polls
The June Election - Jim Schiller
box - The electoral reforms - Jim Schiller
New Order old school
Opposition leaders are afraid - Arief Budiman
Blood in the streets
Demos reek of melodrama - Chris Brown
Not reformasi, transformasi
Student demands are too timid - Y B Mangunwijaya
Box - A hero passes on
Habibie's fling
The President wants a TV station - Ishadi S K
Tommorrow, in Timor Lorosae
Suddenly, freedom in East Timor is no longer a distant dream. -
Richard Tanter
Women on the move
Conference report - Krishna Sen
Box - Women's Congress
Coming out
For 32 years (ex)political prisoners were condemned to a life of
misery - Helene van Klinken
Box - Tapol troubles - When will they end?
Tragedy in Sumba
Analysis of a massacre - David Mitchell
Back on the beat?
Reforming the police - Adrianus Meliala
Society and economy
The price of rice
The role of Bulog - Jeremy Mulholland and Ken Thomas
Environment
Palm oil
Bad news for forests and people - Eric Wakker
Culture
Lightning!
Witty political theatre - Barbara Hatley
Travel
Climb a mountain
Eco-tourism in Sulawesi - Allyson Lankester
Regulars
Editorial
Your say
Newsbriefs
Reviews 1 - Kingsbury
Reviews 2 - Berman
On the net
Indonesian democracy on the net - Waruno Mahdi
Inside Indonesia 58: Apr-Jun 1999
57: No turning back
January - March 1999
Helping a neighbour
The new poor
Upwardly immobilised by the crisis - Lea Jellinek
Shelter from the rain
The crisis closes a shelter for steet kids - Jane Eaton
Tough, poor, unbeaten
On Atauro, drought is the real crisis - Gabrielle Samson
Help that helps
Targetting small business and farming - Vanessa Johanson
Globalisation challenge
Western economic control is the issue - Wim Wertheim
Pak Wertheim
Obituary - Herb Feith
No turning back
NGOs consider their responsibilities - INFID
Australia's response
Aid must address governance and rights - Philip Eldridge
Politics and human rights
Megamania!
Megawati's PDI triumph - Stefan Eklof
No shortcut to democracy
It's all about good policies and good institutions -
Olle Tornquist
Islamic conversations
Four Islamic leaders talk - Hisanori Kato
Who plotted the 1965 coup?
Colonel Lafief says he knows - Greg Poulgrain
Aceh exposed
A legacy of abuse and hurt - IRIP News Service
In the tiger's den
Marwan Yatim's story of torture - Marwan Yatim
Culture
Flower in the grass
Interview with Nyi Supadmi - Jody Diamond
Cockroach
Not a pest but an award winning comic - Laine Berman
Reviews
Beyond the horizon - Ron Witton
Saman - Marshall Clark
Travel
A river runs through it
Journey to a Sumatran village - Jim Della-Giacoma
Regulars
Editorial
Your say
Newsbriefs
Bookshop
The net
Inside Indonesia 57: Jan-Mar 1999
56: 15th Anniversary Edition
Oct-Dec 1998
15th Anniversary
Learning to talk
Habibie's weakness is a plus - Gerry van Klinken
Ballot ballet
The May 1999 elections - Kevin Evans
Raising the West Papua flag
Eyewitness account of demonstrations - Andrew Kilvert
Remembering May
Day of no laws
An Australian amid the Jakarta riots - Vanessa Johanson
Cleansing the earth
How the arts community took part - Marshall Clark
Jakarta's May Revolution
A comparison with other movements - Aboeprijadi Santoso
The morning after...
Habibie: those for and against - Loren Ryter
Rape is rape
Shocking report of Jakarta rapes - Sandyawan Sumardi
Orphans no more
Yogya had the biggest demo - Dwi Marianto
Economy and society
Who murdered the rupiah?
Expert comment on the fiscal crash - Sritua Arief
Tommy's toys trashed
The car industry and Suharto's son - Ian Chalmers
Women do it tough
How the crisis is affecting women - Charlene Darmadi
Worshipping cancer sticks
Cigarette consumption in Indonesia - Catherine Reynolds
Environment
'They just want love...'
Saving the orangutans - Willie Smits
Regulars
Editorial
Your say
Newsbriefs
Bookshop
On the net
Ed Colijn
Inside Indonesia 55: Oct-Dec 1998
Box - The Togian Islands
KATE NAPTHALI falls in love with the Togians, and discovers that health and education are major needs
Read more
The Suharto Government's political prisoners have only very rarely been allowed to speak. Here, for the first time, we have an autobiographical story written by a woman, the wife of an ex-tapol, the mother of his child.
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Christmas in a prison camp
The following excerpts are taken from a diary of letters kept by an Australian woman who lived in Java, Kalimantan and Bali for nine years. In this letter, written in January 1978, the author describes her visit to a detention camp for women political prisoners Just after Christmas 1977. The prisoners have since been released.
The letter begins with a description of the long drive from Semarang west to Pelantungan where the camp was located up in the mountains. The visit was arranged by a Dutch pastor, 'Co'. Fenton-Huie was accompanied by the pastor's wife, Phia, and a Dutch nursing sister, Truus. After abandoning their car which could not travel the last stretch of the rough rocky road, the women had to walk the final kilometres to the camp, which also held 40 delinquent boys. The visitors shared a simple Indonesian meal in the house of one of the guards before entering 'a large barracks-type hall' to witness the camp's Christmas concert.
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Not that I don't love
This short story, written by an ex-political prisoner, has never been published in its original Indonesian version. We cannot disclose the author's real name or the various pseudonyms under which she has been publishing since her release.
A member of Gerwani, a women's organisation with alleged connections with the Indonesian Communist Party, banned since the so-called coup of September 1965, the author seems to have started writing fiction only after her detention. The experience colours much of her writing.
Most of her short stories are about the down and out, the women whom poverty has driven to theft, begging and prostitution, the 'criminals' (or were they the victims?) with whom the author shared her prison cells.
Read more
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