Fears have been raised for Indonesia’s democracy after its Parliament voted to abolish the direct election of local leaders, a post-dictatorship reform credited with assisting President-elect Joko Widodo’s rise to popularity as a Mayor and Governor.
The legislation — passed early on Friday after intensive lobbying — means provincial Governors, district chiefs and Mayors will be elected by legislative bodies rather than directly by the people.
It could lead to Mr. Widodo’s opponents in the new Parliament — in which his coalition will hold just over a third of the seats — using its appointees to block his reforms at the local level.
Direct electionsDirect elections, part of decentralisation measures implemented after the fall of Suharto in 1998, have been credited with producing a handful of promising leaders unconnected to the old elite. They include Mr. Widodo, known as Jokowi, who beat a former general in July’s election in July. Raised in a riverside slum in central Java, Jokowi has no direct ties to the old political and military establishment.
“The bill is a setback. A step back to a process of electing political leaders that is now in the hands of political parties,” said Djayadi Hanan, a political analyst from Paramadina University. “It is like a comeback for the political oligarchy.”
Citing a recent poll by the Indonesian Survey Circle that showed more than 80 per cent of Indonesians opposed the bill, Mr. Hanan argued that Indonesia’s political elites were trying to tighten their grip on power.
The bill has been seen as attempt to even political scores, rushed through by an outgoing Parliament and passed by a coalition of parties led by Prabowo Subianto, the former general who lost the July election to Jokowi. “[The Prabowo coalition] want to humiliate Jokowi in the Parliament, and this is the first battle,” said Eva Sundari, a legislator from Jokowi’s Democratic Party of Struggle.
Belligerent ParliamentThe ruling coalition will account for just over 36 per cent of MPs and unless Jokowi secures the support of another party, he looks set to face a belligerent Parliament after his inauguration on 20 October. More than 200 local leaders, including 11 provincial Governors, are scheduled to be appointed next year and the new bill could help consolidate power in the hands of Jokowi’s opponents.
In the lead-up to the debate and lobbying that preceded the vote, it appeared the bill was likely to be quashed. But outgoing President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s Democratic party, which had the swing vote, reversed its position at the 11th hour and abstained.
Civil society groups and NGOs have vowed to challenge the new law at the constitutional court. — © Guardian Newspapers Limited, 2014
