TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Editorial: A new political breed is born
There are many ways to express disagreement or disappointment with the government’s policies and/or achievements
Change Size
T
here are many ways to express disagreement or disappointment with the government’s policies and/or achievements. You can write directly to the government or write opinion articles contending the policies in newspapers. You can also organize seminars or discourses to evaluate them.
Or, if you consider all those “academic-scientific” approaches are still unable to make changes as expected, you can still organize street protests or rallies in order to make your views heard and heeded by the government – on condition that the protests are non-violent and peacefully held.
But what media mogul Surya Paloh and Yogyakarta Sri Sultan Hamengkubuwono X have done is remarkably recommendable. They initiated a national movement in the form of a mass organization, known as National Democrat (or Nasional Demokrat), in Jakarta on Monday.
The movement has immediately drawn mixed responses from observers and experts. Some consider its initiators – Surya Paloh and Sri Sultan Hamengkubuwono X – as well as signatories, Golkar senior politician Siswono Yudohusodo; former United Development Party (PPP) and subsequently National Awakening Party (PKB) executive Khofifah Indar Parawansa; Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) politician Budiman Sujatmiko; former Muhammadiyah chairman Ahmad Syafii Ma’arif; and Paramadina University rector Anies Baswedan, to name a few, as misfit individuals.
Others label the movement as the Legion of Losers, observing that some of its initiators and signatories are defeated candidates for a number of government and political party posts. No less important are critics who suspect the movement as an embryo for a political organization, with an eventual target of contesting the 2014 general elections.
Despite all the cynicism, the establishment of such a national movement should be positively welcomed as it offers an alternative mechanism in launching protests and criticism toward the government. As Surya Paloh said in his inaugural speech that the National Democrat was established to answer the call for the nation’s restoration, we should not rush to judge that the movement has mere political motives.
And should it be considered politically motivated, at least the movement is committed to maintaining elegance and ethical norms in pursuing its goals, unlike, for instance, the House of Representatives’ Bank Century bailout inquiry special committee which according to many has acted beyond common ethical norms and values while conducting its parliamentary investigation into the bank scandal.
The movement — bearing the name Nationalist Democrat — is indeed a threat to nationalist-democrat-oriented political parties like Golkar, PDI-P and Democratic Party (PD) as it could undermine their influence within the nationalist- democrat community of the country. The threat is more real if the National Democrat later converts into a political party and participates in the 2014 elections.
At this moment, it is premature to say that the movement will become a political party and compete in 2014. Only time will tell whether its founding elements – with a wide variety of social, cultural and religious backgrounds – will remain united and have a common platform to be developed further into a political party as many have predicted.
The first litmus test is whether its existence does confirm the noble goals its founders have set, that is, to provide answers to the nation’s current situation.
