Despite strong resistance from his coalition partners, incumbent President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (SBY) has insisted on choosing Bank Indonesia Governor Boediono as his vice-presidential running mate. Many speculate that SBY’s controversial decision will negatively affect his electability in the upcoming presidential election.

While SBY has his own reasons to choose Boediono, people will now begin to ask whether his strong self-confidence is well founded. Or is the pessimism of those who oppose his decision grounded? Surveys conducted by various research institutions have produced mixed results. Some indicate that SBY will easily enjoy a landslide win, regardless of who he is paired with. Others point to the preponderance of his contenders, especially the partnership of Jusuf Kalla and Wiranto.

There is the argument that SBY relies heavily on his personal popularity. While such an argument is not entirely wrong, this writing will indicate that, as a matter of fact, SBY’s political calculation is more complicated. The effectiveness of SBY’s strategies in winning the legislative election is an indication that he has an accurate understanding of the psychological inclinations of Indonesian voters.

Over the weeks since the legislative elections, the Indonesian people have come to a point where they are fed up with the behavior of political leaders, who care only about their own interests and forget the more fundamental problems of the nation. The fact that party leaders change their coalition partners so easily is proof that they are entirely dictated by their personal ambitions.

By choosing a professional technocrat like Boediono as his running mate, SBY wants to gain at least three strategic advantages.

First, he wants to convince the Indonesian people that he is not part of the class of politicians who are still at a more primitive stage of political practice. On top of this, SBY wants to eliminate the misleading conception, which plagues many new democracies, that political parties are the only mode of subjectivity in politics. Far more important in his view is how to give a chance to the people with best quality in solving the nation’s problems.

Second, SBY is not only supported by the majority of his own people, he is also widely accepted by the international community.

To his credit, he has in no small part helped create the most stable democracy in Southeast Asia. SBY realizes that Indonesia’s inclusion in the G20 should be seen as a momentum through which Indonesia has ample opportunity to substantiate its democratic consolidation with economic progress.

It was Boediono who reminded us through his professorial inauguration speech sometime ago that the ability of a democratic state to survive is determined by the rise of the nation’s per capita income. After Indonesia manages to create political stability, the next item on the agenda should be to focus on accelerating economic development.

Last but not least, SBY is convinced that, as vice president, Boediono will be able to show to his critics that Indonesia can benefit from neoliberal economic globalization as long as we can develop the right economic institutions at the domestic level. With his extensive experience in various economic ministries, Boediono certainly has the relevant capacity to prove that SBY has indeed made the right decision.

The writer is a professor of international politics, he lives in Jakarta.

Popular

Weakened rupiah disrupts business, education plans

Prabowo's rare address raises political concerns

Risky reawakening of state-controlled commodity exports