Current Indonesian politics have been colored by criminal politics and legal practices that kill the essential idea of democracy per se. This conclusion comes from many scholars in the country.
Some may say it darkens the ongoing reform moment achieved by the bloody struggle of the people through the middle of 1998. But it also firmly breaks up the substance of our reform agenda of democratic consolidation.
Indonesia has been moving its democratization process forward as has been noted by the Freedom House in Washington since last 2004. The country has worked itself into the green area on the map of world freedom ranked by the Institution.
This means that Indonesia has been successful in enforcing political rights and civil liberties. The atmosphere is starkly different to years before 2004, especially before 1998.
But this wave could be reversed - to quote Huntington's term (1996) - if the government, the law enforcers, and the judicial system are not able to finish the ongoing clash between the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) and the National Police.
To some extent, the case is not an institutional clash, but the case of suspended KPK deputies Bibit and Chandra themselves. At least, it is a kind of rationalization built by the police. But if we look at the heart of the problem, it no longer concerns Bibit and Chandra.
It is the problem of law enforcement. Hence it is indeed a common problem. We need to stand together on the same foundation, looking at the same horizon, on the same concept of true democracy.
Why?
What we are looking on the surface at this time is what the public has been synthesized in one short term, markus (case broker). To a certain degree, this term is not strong enough to describe the fact. The word should be "law mafia", or the phrase "criminal of democracy", to describe the true picture of our problem today.
Why markus? Markus, or "criminal of democracy" in my word, is a term referring to men behind the legal and political institutions that play the game quietly. Such evil practice reminds us of the conclusion in Taylor's study (1996) about electoral politics throughout developing countries in Asia where elections have two practical senses.
In the first sense, an election could be an essential democratic institution but in another sense it could be a play or drama.
The second sense leads us to believe that elections are actually dirty games manipulated by the invisible evil-hands behind the scene while citizens remain passive spectators.
Thus, winning in the electoral season cannot be automatically aligned with the people winning in the substantial democracy system. In other words, we can jump to the proper conclusion that winning belongs to the mafia, or markus, in our current context.
Our democracy is deadlocked at the end of the tunnel, there's no candle for the exit. And the spreading of markus throughout the levels of the political structure and legal institutions, take the local level up to the national one. The whole country is like a bell ringing alerting to the unavoidable death of our democratic civilization.
Here I remember Hanna Jaeckel, a citizen of the US, who commented on my article titled, "Wanted: Democratic Imagination" (The Jakarta Post, Oct. 9, 2008). She wrote, "You have a marvelous and naturally democratic minded population.
"I lived for some years in Indonesia and found that the Indonesian culture and attitude seems to be naturally democratic. The very root of daily life in Indonesia seemed to be based on communal participation. This is not the case in America. Here it is based upon "me first and me only", thus this cannot be called a "true democracy".
Democracy here really just means "one man one vote". You are fortunate. May your country develop into a robust democracy as more and more people get access to education and information."
To some extent, I was proud to be Indonesian while reading Hanna's comments. But to be honest, Hanna was not totally correct. She is just one person in the world who holds optimism for the future of democracy in Indonesia. Today, democracy in Indonesia is all about popularity. Democracy is all about "I am the only winner". That's why people in power tend to play Machiavellian politics.
If there is no effort to get out of the deadlock, to fight the "criminal of democracy", the state could lead us to democracy's death. The wave of civilization will reverse and even regress to the darkness era.
The point I want to propose is that we need to keep urging the reform agenda and spurring the development of democracy.
There are two important recommendations to deal with the criminalization issue of the KPK. First, the law enforcers should play its moral role in responding the case. It's not just about law enforcement. It's also about moral enforcement.
Second, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono as head of the executive chamber and state, should stand on the same foundation as civil society. It is not all about how to defend partial political interests. It goes beyond that. It is about how to make law and democracy survive in the country.
The writer is a political science lecturer at the University of Indonesia and director of Lembaga Pemilih Indonesia (LPI).
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