freelance journalist –
Jakarta Indonesia
Column
On 20th March, Indonesian parliament passed a bill RUU TNI that allows the army to
be involved in the civic sphere, reminiscent of the New Order dictatorship era. My
instagram is full of people complaining that ‘back to the past’ is really happening in
front of our eyes as if this regression of our democratic reformation is unforeseeable.
With a sinking economy, Indonesia is bleak by any indicator under president Prabowo
Subianto. But something has been muddling inside of my mind. How did the regression
come in the first place during the election two years ago?
Presently I was alone at my home in Yogyakarta, a famous student city in Indonesia,
remembering two years ago. Last year prior to the election, I was in the same city. The
city was in a different mood. Everybody was cheerful about the brighter future,
president Jokowi still in the palace commanding the successful development, no one
cares about the present, and in every street, there are billboards full of cuddly uncle, that
depicted Prabowo using AI generated content as a lovely uncle, that once was fearful.
I still remember about a year ago I warned my friends how disastrous it would be if
Prabowo got elected by posting a video clip from old English Prabowo’s interview in
which he said, “Come on Prabowo, when you’re in power, write your own constitution.”
Perhaps when I posted that, constitutional changes are out of mind for every
Indonesian, but now that he is in power, it is the last step before we are back to the
dictatorship era.
Clearly he did not have a good track record, his career in the military ended in disgrace
after Suharto’s fall from the throne. Yet he is back! He is back with full support of the
political elites and with new technologies and strategies to win over the heart of
Indonesian people. He won at last! His dream has now become a reality. And
Indonesians who remember his past finally can say, “I told you so!”
Perhaps Indonesians are too forgiveful and forgetful to let him win. Two years ago, most
of my friends were supporting him. They said that Gibran, currently a vice-president
who is also a son of Jokowi in a similar case to Sara Duterte in the Philippines, and
Prabowo are the figures that we need to transform Indonesia. They said that we need
change in our system. They said that Prabowo won’t do that anymore and he is a
changed man. I still remember how clueless some people are, how forgetful they are to
the cycle of history, and how ignorant they are to find the slightest facts in history. What
they want is a charismatic strongman, sure did they chose him. And for sure, he
transforms Indonesia back to his buried history. For sure he did what he said as a
strongman.
Yet I don’t blame them for the choice that they made. They did it out of the instinct that
has been manipulated by countless advertisements and false hope. They chose him out
of desperation and out of choice in Indonesian politics. One thing you should know
about Indonesian politics is that people do not really have a choice. It is all made up
from top-bottom. It is the elite’s deeds that jeopardized the future, not them. I only have
a condolence for Dark Indonesia. When you are on the sinking ship, you do not blame
the passenger for choosing the ship. You blame those who decided behind the closed
door the captain of the ship.
I still remember when I was in high school a Tempo Magazine that stated that Jokowi
had decided to make a promise to Prabowo before his second election. He basically
promised that he will support Prabowo after his second election if Prabowo became his
artificial rival in his second election. Through haggling between Jokowi and Prabowo in
2024, they agreed on putting his son, Gibran Rakabuming to be his running mate
bypassing regulations that had been placed during the Reformation era. It is possible
because the Indonesian Constitutional Court judge is Gibran’s uncle, showing full on
nepotism in Indonesian judiciary. And as a time goes by, it really happened while the
magazine is now being forgotten and terrorized on Wednesday. Someone sent a swain’s
head to their office. It is reminiscent of the New Order terror that Indonesians went
through almost three decades ago.
Mohammad Sadli, an Indonesian economist, was right when he stated a famous Sadli’s
law. Basically he said that in the good times come a bad policy and in the bad times
come a good policy. Indonesia two years ago was on the right track economically and full
of optimism, even though there is a democratic backsliding. And the result was this, a
regime that could not think for the people. Full of populism and paternalism. The bad
times have come and perhaps if Sadli’s law is right, the future is actually brighter than
what seems right now. However, Indonesia will go through a darkness to achieve a
brighter future, by experiencing, they will know what is best for them.
Optimism has blinded so many people. Two years ago, I still remember that many
Indonesians are optimistic about the future that has been promised by the government.
It is a politics of hope that has darkened their foresighting. Blind optimism without a
check has caused trouble because people become too confident on their path as if
nothing could go wrong. And when optimism has flashed out, pessimism ate people
alive. That’s what happened to my friend who supported Prabowo because of the
promise of economic growth and now in despair because the purchasing power is down.
Now here we are, on the end of an era. 1998 Indonesian Reformation has died out.
Every single objective from the 1998 Reformation has been thrown back into a dustbin
by our leaders. No more separation between army and civic space. No more anti-corruption efforts. No more freedom of speech. Not a spirit of reformation. The regime of darkness has come to seep into our life. It is an era of Newly New Order. I call it the Illiberal Democratic era, adjoining India and Hungary.
It is a wake up call for Indonesian activists that the old reformation goals have been
ineffectual. We need a new movement based on new ideals. We need to organize against
the new illiberal regime. We need to make a choice that does not use the old tactics and
strategy. Because hoping on the nostalgic movement has turned us into an old-dated
archaic from the bygone era. We need something new that can be supported by the
masses. We need it now and urgently. It is a time for us to reflect. If Sadli’s law is right,
then we need to make it happen. Anguishing the bygone era does not make us better, we
need to make a new demand and resist in every little way.
During the heyday of Sukarno’s Old Order dictatorship in 1960, the first Vice-President
of Indonesia, Mohammad Hatta in criticizing the current government actions and
authoritarian tendency in Our Democracy has said: “However history has also given hope to men. A thing that is precious such as democracy will be appreciated when it is temporarily gone. As long as we want to
learn from the mistake…democracy that fell asleep for a moment will rise up again.”
The Current State of Affairs
Neoliberalism has died. Yet his corpse is not unlived. Domestically we still rely on
neoliberal paradigm, even though internationally it has been buried with death.
Indonesia as we experience right now is a neoliberal state with authoritarian tendencies.
I do not think that Indonesia’s future will lie on socialism, but on the most destructive
extractive capitalism. It is a fact. The left has not been mobilized, they do not
institutionalize against the mighty capitalism. The resistance toward the extractive
regime is sporadic and reactionary at best. It is on the mercy of the elite to be heard by
the regime, yet it failed spectacularly.
In knowing the current state of affairs, what can we do to organize the resistance? In
spite of the would-be an oppressive regime and the destitute of the people that hamper
the resistance, Indonesians must rethink how we fight for our future. It is the duty of
Indonesians to change for the better future. It is a prerequisite for a better Indonesia. It
is a must that shall transcend every generation of Indonesians where they are, who they
are, and what they are. Time has not been kind for us, if we only wait for someone to
lead it, it won’t happen. One needs to be on the move for the transformation to occur in
our lifetime.
The time has ripe for the fruit of revolution to seed its message as dissatisfaction has
spread like a wildfire. From what I have observed, the bureaucrats, small traders,
intellectuals, and ordinaries secretly and privately have sounded dischantment toward
the regime. Even though the media has not publicly broadcast it, if you walk in the
street, you know that people are not happy. They are under terrible suffering,
disillusioned, and under the duress of an absurd regime. A prima facie view on the
media won’t tell you that as it has been polluted by the consent reproduction of the
regime, but it is here to be mobilized. The left needs to capitalize on this occurrence.
In the longer view of history, modern Indonesia has encountered one failed revolution
in 1945-1949. I judged it harsh as a failed revolution because it does not change
Indonesia beyond political independence. Obviously, it succeeded to kick the Dutch
away from Indonesia, but the oppressive socioeconomic structure is still there without
any meaningful transformation. The vision of social justice and democratic Indonesia
that lies as a foundation of the Indonesian revolution was abandoned by the political
elites since they gained independence. As a result, the extractive nature of colonial
capitalism stays to strengthen the post-independence elite. As if a brown man colonized
the other brown man after the revolution. It occurred in Indonesia with its extractive
regime where Indonesian revolution 1945-49 did not dismantle right away. The result is
that Indonesians live in postcolonial situations of socioeconomic dependence and patrimonialism that has colored the indigenous power tradition and utilized by the Dutch in indirect colonialism.
The dream of an equal and justice nation only lives as a blank jargon in the government
while dispossession occurred in any part of Indonesia. The Indonesian state is still what
van den Bosch called staatsbedrijf, a state company where the state is run like a
company to maximize profits while minimizing cost of governance through utilization of
informality as a mode of governance in every sector. For example, in Ian Wilson Politik
Jatah Preman, Indonesia runs a country through the informalized security and political
networks which make it unaccountable and cost people more. The violent force in
Indonesia is informalized as such it is cheap to maintain authority. Privatization of
many Indonesian land and water also demonstrates that the state, as mandated by
constitution, does not do what it should be done to protect the basic humanitarian needs
of the people. In short, we are far from the dream of independent Indonesia as
envisioned by independence thinkers.
