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Editorial: Specially Yogya
Who does not think Yogyakarta is special? Only a few who have had the privilege to taste the lifestyle in this ancient city fail to leave enamored
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Who does not think Yogyakarta is special? Only a few who have had the privilege to taste the lifestyle in this ancient city fail to leave enamored.
Most end up making Yogyakarta their spiritual home, or at the very least, they carry a part of the city with them forever.
While this city is full of lore, it is no fable to say that the sights and sounds of the city change people: People from all walks of life, backgrounds and cultures combine to create a colony of common virtue.
Replete with a rich culture, home to high art, bastion of education, paragon of Javanese sentiment and epicenter of Indonesian history, Yogyakarta is not just a city or a way of life -- it is a state of mind.
The Sultanate of Ngayogyakarta Hadiningrat was established in the mid-18th century when colonial Dutch rulers divided the preceding Mataram kingdom in two.
Despite the division, the sultanate refused to capitulate, triggering numerous uprisings in both the colonial and the modern eras.
From being the site of the rebellion of Prince Diponegoro in the early 19th century to a stronghold of the national revolution in the mid-20th century, Yogyakarta has consistently remained the hub of Indonesia's fighting spirit.
It was the ninth sultan of Yogyakarta who is best remembered as the embodiment of this spirit to win independence. It was under his leadership that the sultanate became the first territory to willingly accede sovereignty to the Republic of Indonesia.
For its contribution, this sultanate, which covers just 3,185 square kilometers, was given the designation of special region with the sultan as its governor.
Sultan Hamengkubuwono IX was a revered man, not just by his "subjects" but also by history.
Not surprisingly he was elected as Soeharto's first vice president in 1973.
Five years later, however, he turned down another nomination for vice president.
At a time when Soeharto was flexing his muscle and consolidating power, Hamengkubuwono IX spurned those authoritarian tendencies to return home and retire from active political life.
The ninth sultan was a king who did not act like one.
He typified the essence of the great philosopher Aristotle centuries earlier who wrote in Politics, "He who is to be a good ruler, must have first been ruled".
The comfort zone that is Yogyakarta persists to this day.
The mantle of leadership has now been assumed by the 10th sultan, who rules with equal grace. Still revered, his words remain divine.
But the circumstances through which the present sultan governs have no parallel with those of his father.
So when President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono issued a decree on Wednesday extending the sultan's governorship of Yogyakarta we felt a tinge of unease.
This is a decree that belies written laws that seek to make leaders -- local and national -- accountable to their people.
Yogyakartans may claim that the sultan is the embodiment of Yogyakarta.
They may well mobilize and rally in the thousands to proclaim their sultan as governor, but how odd it is that they would seek to perpetuate an obsolete system that contradicts every shred of political accountability.
It is not that the sultan has ruled badly. Far from it. Rather, the issue here is not who is governor, but rather how that person gains the position.
Because, by negating the processes of accountability, we are promoting absolutism.
We believe the sultan to be a wise man who understands that sometimes it is not the end that matters but the means by which that end is achieved.
And there is little doubt that if the sultan had to run in an election for governor he would win, perhaps even unrivaled.
Accepting this appointment without an election, no matter how much the people of Yogyakarta claim it to be their will, is an act that corrupts the process towards responsible democratic citizenry.
It is far from a good example for Yogyakartans and a bad precedent for the whole nation.
What typified the ninth sultan was his humility in freely submitting to the sovereignty of the republic.
The current sultan may still retain certain privileges but he is not above the autonomy law, which requires local leaders be elected, irrespective of whether a special law on Yogyakarta is being drafted in the House of Representatives.
"L'*tat, c'est moi! (I am the state)," proclaimed Louis XIV, whose 72 years in power made him Europe's longest reigning monarch.
How long is Yogyakarta to maintain such absolutism, perpetuating a class society of ruler and subject?
Claims of divine heritage or even benevolence do not make power a birthright. Only those who submit themselves to be ruled have the right to think of themselves in the position of ruler.
