Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government and form a new one. This is a most valuable and sacred right — a right which we hope and believe is to liberate the world.
– Abraham Lincoln
THE Indonesian student groups that for weeks kept the government of President T.N.I. Mohammed Suharto on its toes until they brought it down last Wednesday might not have read Lincoln’s views on democracy. But they nonetheless followed his advice. The result is the collapse of Suharto’s 32-year dictatorship in a country of 195 million people, 88 per cent of whom are Muslim. Over 500 people died in weeks of violent protest as tertiary school students called for the reformation of the political system which assumed a government-by-family-and-friends style; ultimately they sought for the president’s ouster.
All the world had seen the signs that Suharto’s road had ended. The economy has collapsed, the citizenry was fed up, and the weeks of riots were accompanied by a constitutional crisis in which the 1,000-member People’s Consultative Assembly, which is dominated by Suharto’s appointees, had withdrawn its support. The army, which propped up the sit-tight government ever since General Suharto, then head of the army, assumed power on March 6, 1967, showed scant support and did little to halt the crisis. In this type of atmosphere, only the 76-year old president, weary but intransigent, seemed unable to recognise the signs. In his last show of bravado, he appeared on national television and restated his determination to remain in office as his “stepping down will not be a solution” to the country’s problems. He’d been chosen constitutionally for another five-year term in March (his seventh) and could only be removed through the constitutional process, he said. The parliament, which was weakened by years of manipulation by the president and his agents, and which normally never challenged Suharto’s grip on power, now grew bold and met mid-this week to demand for his resignation.
Beyond Indonesia’s borders, Suharto couldn’t muster much support. Japan, the country’s closest trade ally, had turned its back and indeed embarked on transporting its citizens from Indonesia. The West was no better. The U.S. expressed a half-hearted concern for stability and peace while surreptitiously goading the opposition on the road to further confrontation. The World Bank postponed a programme of $1.2 billion of new loans, citing the political uncertainty and, together with its sister organisation the IMF, withdrew its expatriate staff from the country. All these buoyed the anti-Suharto forces. The president was abandoned by all but his family; even close friends such as the parliament’s speaker and five other leaders of parliament had turned coat.
Why didn’t General Suharto see it coming? Like Zaire’s Mobutu, he was a leader of the old order who relied on the comfort of his longevity in office, believing that everything would come to pass. The country has had crises in the past, though not this serious, and he had weathered the storms. Acceding to the demands of the opposition would be shirking his responsibility to bring back order, he said. However, the world has changed since the end of the Cold War from which Suharto very much benefited. Both Japan and the West, which propped up the dictatorship as a bulwark against Communism, have felt morally bound now to oppose such long-lived democratic fakes. And the economy, from which they could have gained, had deteriorated since 1993 when the Indonesian rupiah exchanged at the rate of 2,096 to one U.S. dollar. Besides, they could do business with an alternative government and buy the country’s healthy stock of oil through the normal process.
Yes, Suharto is credited with bringing an impressive stability to his country, albeit with the crushing of all opposition, and unifying the multi-ethnic people. Nascent hostilities with Malaysia, which peaked under Indonesia’s first leader, President-for-life Ahmed Sukarno, had ended in 1966. With petro-dollar and other exports in trade with Japan, the U.S. and Singapore, the country became a respected member of ASEAN and OPEC. Suharto built a robust economy (for instance, five years ago when Nigeria’s GDP and per capita income were $28 billion and $230 respectively, Indonesia’s were $122 billion and $630 respectively), built 116 airports and 7.8 billion passenger-kilometre of railway line. Under him, Indonesia achieved a literacy rate of 85% — one of the highest in the Third World. However, with the recent upset in the economies of the Asian Tigers, increasing demands for political reforms, as well as corruption and embezzlement, public disconted mounted. Suharto was a target of all reform-minded people inside and outside Indonesia. Certainly, his time was up. Ironically, the current upheaval was caused by an IMF-imposed increase in prices of fuel and electricity. His resignation, which was welcomed by Japan, the U.S. and some Asian countries, came so late in the day.
The challenge ahead of the country under its new president, Basharudeen A. Habeebi, a German-trained engineer who deputised for Suharto, is great. First, the two issues of economy and corruption have to be addressed. The new government faces the daunting task of healing the practured society. It can expect to receive Western aid and the deferrence of the sanctions threatened. There is also the serious question of political reforms. As ‘home grown’ democracies appear to be increasingly unpalatable worldwide because they only breed new forms of dictatorship, Indonesia must have to address the constitutional provisions that made Suharto to overstay his welcome the way he did. The parliament has to be strenghtened to check abuse of power. Towards this end, it has to be exorcised of elements of the old order and or be expanded to accommodate more shades of opinion. The army may be commended for remaining so long outside politics, but they had nevertheless helped Suharto to overstay, never questioning his methods. As the regime careered towards the precipice this week, the Defence Minister, General Wiranto, appeared on TV and expressed the army’s opposition to the calls for Suharto’s resignation. Such overzealousness is a threat to Indonesia’s democracy and must be checked. The lesson for us all is that a people living under a form of democracy have the right to express their likes and dislikes about the way they are governed. If they are fed up with the system, they have the right — and capacity — to change it. That’s what the Indonesian students and their lecturers, with support from the country’s constituent parts, did. And that’s exactly what Abraham Lincoln envisaged for a healthy democratic system.
* Published in my column, Melting Pot, in the New Nigerian Weekly today
