•    HOME   
•    NEWS   
•    BUSINESS   
•    INTERNATIONAL   
•    TECH   
•    SPORTS   
•    LIFE & TIMES   
•    OPINION   
•    MY JAKARTA   
•    BLOGS   

For Indonesia, the decade now passing has been marked by the transition to democracy. In fits and starts, with all the usual growing pains, the country has come to be known as the most stable democracy in Southeast Asia. Our neighbors in Malaysia and Singapore live with curbs on civil liberties — like press freedom — that stunt the political process and keep opposition movements weak. Thailand has been going through political turmoil in the years following its 2006 military coup. In the Philippines, political killings, like the recent massacre related to local political rivalries in Mindanao, make that system seem both shaky and brutal.

In this context, the past year was nothing if not a success for our young democracy. There were two elections, on April 9 for the legislature and July 8 for the presidency, and despite technical problems with ballot papers, the election law and voter registration they passed peacefully with no significant unrest and a general sense that the results were acceptable.

If there was a bad guy in the process, it was the General Elections Commission (KPU). While it implemented a new way of voting for the House of Representatives that allowed voters to choose individuals instead of just political parties for the first time, this and other technical changes were confusing and the KPU was often faulted for its inability to get the voter lists right and for various other flaws.

As a consequence of two things, voting for individuals and the number of political parties in this year’s elections — 34 — there was a new broadsheet ballot that was the largest ever, carrying names of parties, their symbols, candidates’ names and their photos. In another change, the KPU implemented a system of ticking a box next to either a name or a political party to cast a vote. The change was tough and not smooth. Ballot papers were late in many cases and the KPU became the target of criticism.

The low point in the process was a violent rally on Feb. 2 in Medan that resulted in North Sumatra Council Speaker Abdul Aziz Angkat getting roughed up and dying of a heart attack. The protesters were demanding the formation of a new Tapanuli province but the event did little for their cause and ended in long prison sentences for three of the rally leaders.

The same month, the KPU was embroiled in a controversy over the voters list that would last all year, with two political parties, the Great Indonesia Movement Party (Gerindra) and the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), voicing the harshest protests against double registrations and names missing from the list. It never did get sorted out.

In April, the Democratic Party was the big winner, with PDI-P, Golkar, the National Awakening Party (PKB), and the National Mandate Party (PAN) trailing behind. The results meant that President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s Democratic Party, a relatively minor force in 2004, became the largest party in the House and the dominant party in the country, weakening the old warhorses, Golkar and PDI-P.

Registration for the presidential race opened in May, with Yudhoyono the clear front runner. Tensions with former Vice President Jusuf Kalla came fully into the open when a badly divided Golkar chose Kalla to stand for president. Former President Megawati Sukarnoputri surprised no one by leading her PDI-P back into the fray as a presidential candidate.

The only surprises were in the choices made for the No. 2 slot on the tickets. The president chose as his running mate former Bank Indonesia governor and one-time economics professor Boediono. The choice left some political party leaders irritated since Beodiono was a technocrat and represented no party. Kalla’s choice was retired army general Wiranto of the People’s Conscience Party (Hanura), whose record is smeared by accusations of human rights violations in East Timor and who ran for president in 2004. Megawati’s choice was another surprise — Gerindra chairman Prabowo Subianto, a retired army general and former Suharto son-in-law who also has a checkered human rights record from his days as a high-flying force in the New Order military establishment.

Another first this year were live televised presidential and vice presidential debates. There were few fireworks in the oh-so-polite atmosphere of the debates but the possibility of heated exchanges was at least tempting.

In the end, ho-hum. Opinion polls consistently predicted that the Yudhoyono-Boediono duo would win a sweeping victory … and they did. The landslide win with about 60 percent of the vote in his favor gave the president a resounding mandate for a second term and left most grumblers with little ammunition to use to dispute the results. Kalla quickly conceded and slipped quietly away, eventually losing his chairmanship of the Golkar Party to Aburizal Bakrie, who brought the party (at least formally) into the ruling coalition. What protests remained never gained much traction and a Constitutional Court challenge by Megawati and Prabowo based on the voters list mess was tossed out.

As expected, Megawati boycotted the inauguration of the president, the second time she has done so.

Yudhoyono was sworn in Oct. 20, declaring that his priority was to improve peoples’ lives. “The essence of the five-year program is the enhancement of people’s welfare and the strengthening of democracy and justice,” the president said in his inaugural address.

With all major parties except the PDI-P (and even they flirted with signing up) joining the Democrat-led House coalition, the only drama left was the jockeying for seats in the cabinet. It all went smoothly. The naming of Hatta Rajasa as chief economic minister raised a few eyebrows since the veteran politician has no experience in an economic post. His job is to ease the reform path in the House thus allowing the technocrats to do their work. The ministers were installed on Oct. 22.

So much for the script. Lost in the noise and fury over the Bank Century scandal has been the president’s plans for his first 100 days in office. Infrastructure development, improvements in education and delivery of basic services and bureaucratic reforms are all on the agenda. With the elections out of the way, these tasks were supposed to become the first priority. Instead, the political season has been extended as two of the president’s top aides and most respected technocrats, Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati and Boediono, have their necks on the block in the current House investigation over the Bank Century bailout.

The politics of that case make the 2009 elections seem like a stroll in the park. Emmy Fitri