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During President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s earlier days in power, he was known as the man who led Indonesia as it became Southeast Asia’s poster child of progress and democracy.

Does such a label still apply, considering the state of the country today?

First, let’s look at corruption. Even when we close our eyes, we can still see how rampant graft is.

Here we have a president who once, and indeed still does, bragged that graft-busting would be one of the core pillars of his administration. Yet if we ask the public which political party is most corrupt these days, it wouldn’t be surprising if the majority said Yudhoyono’s ruling Democratic Party.

The Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) has named Muhammad Nazaruddin and Angelina Sondakh as suspects in the Southeast Asian Games scandal. Key suspects and witnesses in the case have also implicated other big-name Democratic politicians, including a couple of top lawmakers, as well as Sports and Youth Minister Andi Mallarangeng and party chairman Anas Urbaningrum.

Anas’s name has been mentioned repeatedly, but one can’t help but wonder whether he was actually involved in the scandal. Instead of issuing some sort of reprimand, Yudhoyono announced during a televised press conference that he would not suspend Anas short of final action from KPK.

One wonders if his decision is purely a pro-law one, or more of a political face-saving endeavor.

Next, let’s visit religious freedom.

First, there’s the bloody Cikeusik anti-Ahmadiyah attack. A year after three Ahmadis were killed and dozens forcible evicted, the authorities have yet to fully resolve the case by bringing to justice the perpetrators of the horrifying incident.

Then there’s the savage attacks on the Shiites on the island of Madura, where houses were ransacked by sickle-carrying mobs, and an Islamic boarding school was set on fire.

The local police promised it would try its best to prevent more attacks. But a pledge of prevention is not enough. Shouldn’t the men in brown arrest those who were involved in the attacks?

And, of course, there’s the whole hullabaloo with the GKI Yasmin church, where despite a legal document and a decision made by the Supreme Court, members are still prevented from holding a Sunday service there.

Here we have a classic case of the tyranny of the majority, where Islamic hard-liners dictate what goes on in this country, including how to interpret the law.

We’ve also seen the government’s failure in handling labor disputes.

This is not to say that I disapprove of increasing the minimum wage, but when we have thousands of workers taking to the streets, paralyzing the toll roads and factories, how is that a good thing for our country?

It suffocates our economy, it also besmirches our reputation with investors, who only want to put their money in countries which can guarantee  security and stability.

Equality is one thing. But the law, which is a key component of democracy, should also be upheld. When the workers are breaking the law, the government needs to show that they simply can’t do that.

This is not merely blaming the workers for what they did. This is actually a call on the government to play a larger role in resolving the problem. But whatever decision it makes, it has to be done using the right process.

At the end of the day, this is really a question of leadership.

When the people elected our leaders, they did so in the belief that they would make this nation of ours a better place.

Armando Siahaan is a reporter at the Jakarta Globe. Follow him on Twitter @jakartajourno or e-mail him at armando.siahaan@thejakartaglobe.com.