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Interests, missing patron leave PPP in state of flux
More than words: United Development Party (PPP) deputy chairman Emron Pangkapi addresses the partyâs national meeting on Wednesday in Bogor, West Java
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span class="inline inline-center">More than words: United Development Party (PPP) deputy chairman Emron Pangkapi addresses the party's national meeting on Wednesday in Bogor, West Java. The meeting was held to evaluate the party's performance in the April 9 legislative election and encourage party reconciliation ahead of the presidential election following an internal rift. JP/Hasyim Widhiarto
The secretary of the United Development Party's (PPP) South Sulawesi chapter, Muhammad Aras, found that his cell phone was ringing almost non-stop on March 23, the day that party chairman Suryadharma Ali made an appearance at a Gerindra Party rally in Jakarta and endorsed the presidential bid of Gerindra chief patron Prabowo Subianto.
'Many party colleagues were surprised by Pak Suryadharma's appearance at the [Gerindra] campaign event, and immediately called me to ask for an explanation,' Aras told The Jakarta Post on Thursday on the sidelines of the PPP's national meeting in Bogor.
'Almost all of them complained about his decision to share a stage with Prabowo, at the same time that many PPP members were working hard to help the party win the April 9 legislative election,' he said.
Many quick counts have predicted that the PPP garnered at least 6 percent of the vote in the April 9 legislative election, a slight increase from the 5.33 percent garnered in 2009.
Despite Suryadharma's role in improving the PPP's recent election performance, Aras insisted that Suryadharma must explain to party members the reason behind his premature endorsement of Prabowo, claiming that his move had severely discouraged many PPP supporters at the grassroots level.
'Before his appearance at the [Gerindra] rally, we were still thinking that Pak Suryadharma was the party's best senior member. After he made the appearance, why didn't he just tell PPP supporters to vote for Gerindra?' Aras said.
Suryadharma, who also serves as the country's religious affairs minister, is facing mounting calls to step down from a group of party executives and local leaders following his 'unauthorized' participation in the Gerindra rally at Bung Karno Stadium last month. Wearing PPP paraphernalia, Suryadharma even made a speech in front of Gerindra supporters, giving an early signal that the two parties might form an alliance ahead of the presidential election.
Suryadharma's opponents argued that his support for Prabowo went against the party's national meeting in February, which endorsed seven potential presidential candidates: Suryadharma; former vice president Jusuf Kalla; Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) presidential candidate Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo; Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI) chairman Din Syamsuddin; National Awakening Party (PKB) politician Khofifah Indar Parawansa; East Kutai Regent Isran Noor; and former Constitutional Court chief justice Jimly Asshiddiqie.
Suryadharma, with support from, among others, PPP deputy chairman Hasrul Azwar, fellow Cabinet minister Djan Faridz and head of the PPP's Jakarta branch Abraham 'Lulung' Lunggana, fired five senior party members, including PPP deputy chairman Suharso Monoarfa and the head of the PPP's South Sulawesi branch Amir Uskara, on April 16 for planning a meeting to topple him from the leadership.
In a joint press conference
with Prabowo at the party's headquarters, Suryadharma later announced that the PPP had officially formed an alliance with Gerindra to support Prabowo's presidential candidacy.
Gerindra, which secured around 12 percent of the vote, according to the majority of early counts, must form a coalition with other political parties in order to reach a total of at least 25 percent of the vote and pave the way for Prabowo's presidential bid.
Suryadharma's moves, however, immediately backfired, with many top PPP executives ' including secretary-general Romahurmuziy and deputy chairman Emron Pangkapi ' holding a national leadership meeting (Rapimnas) several days later to temporarily dismiss Suryadharma and inaugurate Emron as the PPP's acting leader.
With intervention from charismatic 85-year-old cleric Maimun Zubair, who chairs the party's sharia assembly, Suryadharma and his challengers agreed to meet at the party's national meeting last week to reconcile their disagreements.
The two-day meeting, which was attended by dozens of party executives and branch leaders, concluded in restoring Suryadharma's leadership after he made an apology during a closed-door hearing and admitted that his support for Prabowo was a violation of the party's statutes.
Several sources within the party, however, said the party's half-hearted reconciliation indicated that its top executives maintained diverse interests ahead of the presidential election.
'It is no secret that the party has been divided into several factions ahead of the presidential election. Each of them supports a certain candidate and, of course, wants something in return [from that candidate],' PPP board of experts deputy chairman Ahmad Zainuri said.
The absence of 'influential and fair-minded figures' in the PPP has also led to conflicts arising quickly within the party following such disagreements, according to Ahmad.
'The PPP needs a respected but neutral party figure to arbitrate these opposing factions and compromise each [group's] interests for the sake of the party. Without such a figure, another internal conflict will only end up with someone losing or winning,' he said.
Suryadharma is supposed to end his tenure during a national congress in 2015. The PPP's national meeting, however, instructed the party to hold its national congress this year, indicating continuing distrust within the party after Suryadharma's return to leadership.
Suryadharma, however, refused to speculate about his future in the party.
'We all agreed to return to square one ['¦] We have agreed to join hands and walk together to help run the country,' he said in a press conference after the closing of the party's national meeting.
Established in 1973 following the merger of four Islamic political parties ' Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), the Indonesian Muslim Party (Parmusi), the Indonesian Islamic Union Party (PSII), and the Islamic Education Union (Perti) ' the PPP was the only Islamic-based party in the country until 1998.
The PPP managed to garner at least 15 percent of the vote in each of the five general elections held between 1977 and 1997, but later found its popularity decreasing following the establishment of new Islamic-based parties including the PKB, the National Mandate Party (PAN) and the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS).
In a previous interview with the Post, PPP election campaign (Bapilu) head Fernita Darwis admitted that the lack of popular figures had made it difficult for the party to meet its target of garnering 12 percent of the vote in the April 9 legislative election.
'The PPP is not like the PDI-P, which was lucky enough to enjoy increasing popularity due to the so-called 'Jokowi-effect',' she said, referring to the Jakarta governor who is considered by many surveys as the strongest contender in the upcoming presidential election.
Several senior party members who attended the party's national meeting, such as former PPP chairman Hamzah Haz and former lawmaker Zarkasih Nur, also seemed to play merely a symbolic role instead of actively taking part in the party's conflict resolution.
Head of the PPP's West Java branch, Rachmat Yasin, who aggressively gathered support from local PPP leaders for Suryadharma's removal, said Hamzah's attendance was needed to give 'stronger legitimacy' at the reconciliation meeting.
Serving as vice president from 2001 to 2004, Hamzah, who recently turned 74, is the only senior PPP member so far who has managed to secure the country's second-highest public post.
University of Indonesia (UI) Islamic studies expert, Yon Machmudi, said the PPP's political moves ahead of the presidential election indicated that the party's top executives had put their personal, pragmatic agenda above the party's main role of promoting the interests of Indonesian Muslims.
Suryadharma's premature approach to Gerindra, for example, created widespread speculation that he had a personal agenda even before the legislative election took place, Yon added.
'The approach made people think that Suryadharma desperately wants to aim for a higher political position following the end of his tenure as Cabinet minister,' he said.
Semarang-based Wahid Hasyim University's political Islam observer, Agus Riyanto, echoed Yon's view, adding that the diminishing role of clerics in the party's decision-making process would harm the future of the party.
'Currently, the PPP only has Mbah Moen [Maimun] as the most-respected figure that its supporters still listen to. However, the personal interests of PPP party leaders ahead of the presidential election are so strong that opposing factions within the party will likely ignore his call for an ishlah [reconciliation] and ignite another conflict,' he said.
