LOOMING NOW: THE AGE OF UNCERTAINTY
There’ll soon be a new leader next door –
ageing hardliner Prabowo Subianto. He’s Indonesia’s dark lord with a worrying
past of alleged human rights abuses, yet overwhelmingly elected in the February
national poll. He’ll take over on 20
October.
Some expect the change from the calming Joko ‘Jokowi’
Widodo to be seamless. Others fear his
tough guy successor will drive out democracy from the world’s fourth most
populous nation and return to a
military-led autocracy – as in last century.
What will Jokowi hand-over after two five-year terms
in power? Some differences are huge,
A trip between the East Java capital Surabaya and the
province’s major hill city Malang through congested villages was once a
five-hour ordeal. Now the 80-kilometre
journey on a toll road takes about an hour, thanks to Pak Infrastruktur.
Since 2014 Jokowi's government put down 2,700 km of bitumen
at a dazzling pace using 24/7 Chinese labour and loans; the present debt is reportedly
US$27.5 billion.
Projects
involving national highways, village roads, airports and dams were all transformative, speeding trade. During his decade the population grew by 27
million. The natural increase matches the
number
of people living in Australia.
Jokowi in a hard hat symbolised a shovelling aside of the
avalanches of blocking bureaucracy. He dug
through by treating the government like a business and finding big backers,
mainly from Beijing.
Another
achievement already introduced but rapidly enlarged is the national insurance health
system. It has serious flaws as the industry
exploits its many weaknesses, but it remains an essential helping ease worries
about paying for medical care.
Then
came nationalism. Jokowi’s government
peacefully negotiated control
of the huge gold and copper Freeport mine in West Papua from the US owners and
now has 51 per cent of the company.
Foreign
affairs was left to career diplomat Retno Marsudi, a lady of no great
achievements. She’s off
to the UN so Prabowo has to find another FM, hopefully a
civilian.
All
good - but Jokowi’s legacy has been clawed by Indonesia’s Gorgons – Korupsi,
Kolusi, Nepotisme.
For
Jokowi did dirty
deals to keep his family in power ripping his reputation as
humble Mr Clean from a riverside mudbank
shack. His PR story claims he’s a clever
climber who got to the top without carrying a rifle or wearing Muslim robes. Nor
was he carrying the genes of a feudal Sultanate.
What he did have then and now is a mentor – US
educated former four-star general turned businessman and prominent Protestant Luhut
Binsar Pandjaitan, 77.
Officially
he’s Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs and Investment but on the
street he’s Prince Regent and Lord Luhut, titles that infuriate.
He sued two sniggers for defamation and lost.
Before
Jokowi became a poli he partnered with Luhut in a furniture export deal. The younger
man got into public life through the mayoralty of the small Central Java city
of Solo, then as governor of Jakarta.
Jokowi
was seen as pure Javanese, socially low key and physically slim; an ideal model
for the nation’s marvellous batik shirts, but insufficiently sinewy to wear the
uniform of office. His rank was popularity and here he had five stars.
In
2015 he took then-PM Malcolm Turnbull on a blusukan (walkabout)
of public markets. That happy scene is
for the archives. Today Prabowo is into
media control. He waves from jeeps and shuns
the media apart from one awkward tussle with Al Jazeera.
There’ll
be little access for
independent journos ahead, so anticipate few facts but many rumours.
Only
skilled cultural anthropologists noted the kid from the kampung was enigmatic
and surreptitiously devious, offering ambiguous “why not?” answers to journo’s
questions.
Like
Icarus he forgot the altimeter. Denied
under the Constitution to extend his stay he used his brother-in-law, a Supreme
Court judge to bypass age rules. That
let his eldest son Gibran stand for office and win the vice presidency. Jokowi’s cleanskin reputation was flayed nationally
- likewise his lad’s.
Old
social media accounts allegedly published by Gibran rubbishing Prabowo during
his earlier tries for the top job have been dismissed as
fakes, but the damaging scuttlebutt has spread.
Prabowo
is certainly a worry, and not just to his sidekick. Australian researcher of military crimes in
East Timor Pat Walsh has asked
if he’s a “fit and proper person” to be president, detailing the commander’s actions
in the former Indonesian province. Walsh concluded “no”.
In
1998 Prabowo was cashiered for disobeying orders. That was amid the revolution
which saw the authoritarian Soeharto quit the presidency after 32 years of
despotic rule.
Prabowo
fled to exile in Jordan following his divorce from Soeharto's daughter Siti. He
publicly returned in 2008 after his former father-in-law died but failed to get
into politics via any established organisation.
So
he started Gerindra (Great Indonesia Movement), now the third
largest party. Calling it right-wing is too simplistic. It’s certainly
bombastically nationalistic and carries a whiff of fascism
along
with contradictory social benefit programmes like free lunches for school kids.
Once
hostile minor parties are now clamouring to bed down in Prabowo’s coalition and
suckle the teats of power leaving the government to face no opposition.
Helped
by a mainly partisan media Prabowo’s people have been erasing mentions of his
alleged human rights abuses . These awkward stories that he dismisses or
denies saw him refused entry to the US and Australia earlier this century.
Indonesia
street stalls are already selling photoshopped official portraits of the upcoming
leaders to mount on lounge walls. The 73-year
old has shed wrinkles; his 38-year deputy has garnered wisdom lines.
An
ANU conference of students and scholars in September held an Indonesia Update:
How Jokowi changed Indonesia.
Their
predictions of Prabowo’s rule run from maybe a matured reformist to the baton-master
of Soeharto Mark Two and the flight of what’s left of democracy. Most agree he’s a chameleon. ANU Associate
Professor Marcus Mietzner reportedly said:
“Widodo’s enduring mark on his
country may well be his decision and ability to put Prabowo into the presidency
after defeating him twice and questioning his abilities.”
To a Westerner raised in the culture
of confrontational politics the idea of a winning leader appointing his
twice-defeated bitter rival as Minister of Defence sounds as whacky as eating
cats - or a splendid example of forgiveness by a Muslim that Christians might
emulate.
Whatever, Jokowi’s endorsement has
propelled Prabowo into power tethered to Gibran to keep an eye on Daddy’s
Nusantara – the new capital on Borneo Island. There are already hints that Prabowo’s not too keen on
finding the cash.
Once in control the prez may send his
VP into a dead-end job, like encouraging shy investors to rethink Pappa’s
project.
We don’t know – and neither do the
bemused ANU conference experts, as confused as those who live in the
archipelago. Expect a political future
as changeable as the climate – an age of uncertainty.
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First published in Pearls & Irritations 30 September 2024: https://johnmenadue.com/looming-now-in-indonesia-the-age-of-uncertainty/
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