ASIAN AFFAIRS INTERVIEW WITH JUSUF WANANDI Chairman of the board - Centre for Strategic and International Studies (1) PEOPLE ARE GOING TO SUFFER Serge Berthier- Gus Dur (Abdurrahmann Wahid) is quite confident that the present government will go and his party will be the cornerstone of any new system. Do you have such confidence in the ability of the opposition? Jusuf Wanandi.- I’m not too sure I am that confident. Of course I am confident that after ten years our current problems will be over, but I don’t know what will happen in the meantime, that is the problem! One can think that ten years in a history book is nothing. Unfortunately, people are going to suffer. SB.- When you think of the 960s, all was not so bad, or not as bad as the press is making it today… JW.- Yes, but the question is, had we the chance to start anew, most probably we should not do it the way we have done. Following the Korean model of development, where you can postpone political development until after you have achieved a certain level of economic development, was a mistake. Now we have a political problem: if we don’t solve the political problem first, we cannot solve the economic problem. SB.- Initially Soekarno installed, in 1946, a full constitutional democracy. It led to the collapse in disunity of one government after another till he cut the power of the parliament in 1959. A decade of economic development had been lost. Do you think that Soeharto who witnessed such an experiment remained all his political life under the spell of that period and could not see that time had changed? JW.- Soeharto didn’t understand what democracy was, and in a sense, in the beginning, neither did we. At that time, I was close to the government (2). None of us was very much aware of other models of development other than the Korean one, so in good faith we thought we could postpone political development in spite of economic development. But we missed one point, that is the limitation of one man. Soeharto started off. After a while, he just would let it continue, without taking a new step. Because we did not limit him at the beginning, after the first ten years, we could not control him any more. All the levers of power were in his hand, more or less. So he went on and on, on a single track, and that is why we have this situation now. SB.- A few years ago, Soeharto launched a number of initiatives, one of them being the creation of the influential Indonesian Association of Muslim Intellectuals (ICMI). He also commissioned an electoral reform study that seems to be the blueprint used today to alter the electoral laws (3). JW.- Nevertheless Soeharto would have liked to stay in power forever, and therefore, all these gimmicks were just designed for this purpose. He never meant to allow political development. He just wanted to buy time for him, for his family. Therefore, these political gimmicks were survival tools to stay at the top. SB.- Regardless of the economic crisis which has been a catalyst, was then Indonesia heading for a serious political crisis? JW.- Definitely. The economic crisis made the regime, which was supposedly strong before, vulnerable earlier, that's all. It exposed to the naked eye that the king had no clothes. SB.- Now you don't have a king anymore, only a President that is shortening his mandate and calling an election. Where do we go from there? JW.- First, we have to identify our mistakes and start to think about a new strategy of development for the longer term. But we are not at that stage yet, because we have an economic crisis. Everyone is grabbing to survive on the most basic. At the highest level, the political level, everyone would like to grab the power, to betray Soeharto. It is like in the stock market. The pendulum swings one way and swings back the other way. SB.- To reach a new equilibrium, how long could it take? JW.- Look at the Philippines and what happened when President Marcos left after thirteen years of martial law. It took five years for Corazon Aquino, the new President, just to stabilize the situation. After that, she had only one year left to put things in order. Therefore only Fidel Ramos could continue. In our case, it is even worse: we had thirty two years, not thirteen, of one man rule. The pendulum has swung much more, while Indonesia is a much bigger and much more diverse country than the Philippines are. Therefore we are going to have some chaos for the time being. It is semi-anarchy. That is what we are experiencing everyday. SB.- Your view is that no one sees the whole picture. It is basically a fight for a share of the pie, without due consideration for the pie itself? JW.- Yes, because for the people it is the first time they have the opportunity to do so, so they do it, not thinking about the nation, not thinking of the longer term. SB.- Do you include in your comments the present government and President Habibie himself? JW.- Yes, Habibie himself, everybody. SB.- Yet he is calling an early election… JW.- I am dreading the election. SB.- Which means? JW.- Which means I am not sure how it is going to come out. First, I am not sure whether it is going to be held on time, because there are so many difficulties to be faced: the law, the administrative and technical preparation, the recognition of parties, the candidacies (4). Just to be sure of that is quite a big challenge. There is nothing that is very clear because we have never had a real election since 1955. The problem is that every election from 1971 and so forth, was rigged so that the government could stay in power. SB.- But this time, it is going to be a multi party election? JW.- Hopefully! But I am also worried that the government will try to tamper with the elections… SB.- And be reelected? JW.- It is not impossible because the government is the old regime and they are so used to that. SB.- However the electoral laws have been changed dramatically and Golkar does not seem to be the winner in the process but rather the loser. And many parties are allowed to compete. It would take a very sophisticated machinery to tamper with the present format, and it would be very expensive. JW.- Well, the government can still cheat. They are trying to do it now. First, the government party (Golkar) has been trying to draft in the legislation that the civil servants can participate in the parties. That is very bad, because there is a conflict of interests, and they can cheat again (5). Secondly, the armed forces have to keep a distance, but they have been involved before and they can put the pressure on the people (6). Only without them, is there a good chance that the elections could be fair. That is why a lot of controls have to be put in place, with an independent election committee, strict supervision by our own people and by international observers. It is a critical problem. SB.- But can you have control when, as you say, there is semi-anarchy? To rig an election, you certainly need good control, but what is more and more obvious is that the government has less and less control when communal violence erupts. So to me, the government looks like the last one able to rig anything, unless the army takes sides, a thing General Wiranto has said will not happen? JW.- This is why Gus Dur would like to have a reconciliation. Such a thing would strengthen the government. But it means also a sharing of power, and that is what the government does not want. Yet, Habibie doesn’t have the broad base that is needed to get moving again. Something has to give but such a position and the spreading anarchy make it almost impossible to have fair elections. If there is no fair election, there will be a social revolution. The government doesn't realize that because Mr. Habibie doesn’t understand anything of it. He thinks everything is all right! He is surrounded by people who are true believers, who have a certain political agenda and who would like to have power to achieve it (7). SB.- So you think Indonesia is heading for a fight? JW.- We are already in a fight, and it will only get worse. SB.- That is not a pretty picture? JW.- It is not pretty. If we don’t want to recognize it, we cannot grow. It is not a pretty picture and for the time being, talking about the future and an economic strategy, is almost futile. SB.- It may be futile, but people need common goals. How can you organize a government with so many parties and people? None of them seem to share anything except a negative view of everything, except maybe the government, but you attribute its attitude to blindness? JW.- Currently, everyone is grabbing each issue as a tool for gain. One election is not going to solve that way of thinking. The impact of the present situation will last. If you start killing people so easily, people get used to killing each other, like during the French Revolution. So that is what is going to happen. It will take five years, ten years, I don’t know. SB.- I find you overtly pessimistic, but let's assume that you are right. At some stage, people want order out of chaos. That is how Soekarno and Soeharto arrived to power. JW.- From today’s perspective, it seems very difficult to see a strong man grabbing power. I hope it is not going to happen, but you never can tell. If the chaos is so big and terrorism creeps in, it would be dramatic. Of course, it is not impossible, but you don’t forget so easily what we have been through with our absolute ruler, so it is difficult to imagine that some people would like to have one again. SB.- But when people are desperate, when they live in fear, they tend to have a short memory… JW.- To me, we are today a bit like China was at the onset of the Cultural Revolution. The difference is that we don’t have, like China, the People’s Liberation Army. Our armed forces (ABRI) are, so it seems, divided. Although they consolidated themselves early in January 1999 (8) and it is clear that General Wiranto is a key player in the elections to come if he lines up with Golkar, it will be a critical factor for Golkar to reelect Habibie. At the same time, if they do that, it will be chaos afterwards. Let's hope that he will stay independent, so let us hope that after he has consolidated his power, he will have enough leverage to oppose Habibie, or not to oppose him, but to refuse the pressure to take sides. SB.- According to you, Golkar and President Habibie are working together, in order to stay both in power. But it is the same Habibie who has curtailed Golkar's power and pushed for new electoral laws that will greatly weaken Golkar's electoral machine. Can we really consider that they are still one and the same thing? SB.- Well, Golkar is under the government. Therefore, Habibie can impose the idea that he is going to be the next candidate. On that score, I think Golkar cannot do very much to oppose such an option. It would be the best they can expect. SB.- But is it an option that Habibie wants to take assuming he will run for the Presidency? JW.- In my analysis, Habibie has to be with Golkar, and most probably in coalition with the PPP (9), because Golkar itself will never have a majority (in the Assembly). They will get 20 to 30% at the most. That is their realistic objective today, because they have to fight for their own image. SB.- In the countryside, Golkar can take the credit for any infrastructure development that took place. They will play heavily such a hand… JW.- Yes, but their image is so bad now, because you can say that everything that went wrong, was the work of Golkar and the armed forces, with Soeharto on top. The people feel that strongly. One cannot cheat them anymore. SB.- If that is true, then you should not be too worried about the election. JW.- Hopefully yes but the State apparatus is still very big. We all know how State power can be used by governments in place. That is why the freedom of the press is so critical to keep the pressure on, otherwise people who are in power would never be honest. A government always has to be under control. Any government, anywhere, they are all the same. Never trust them for one minute. Whether it is Thatcher or Helmut Kohl it is the same. It is never enough. Only Lee Kuan-yew and Deng Xiao-ping have been relatively wise to withdraw and be in the background instead of waiting for the day of reckoning. Politicians always miss the momentum because at some stage they lose their ability to feel their surroundings. SB.- Would it be an option for Indonesia to look at the constitutional system of Malaysia to overcome the problem of a very diverse society? JW.- Well, to have racially based parties, as they have, has to be a temporary measure. But we don’t really have the same problem. In Malaysia the majority is Malay, but there is an ethnic balance, with maybe a 25%-25%-50% split between the three ethnic groups that comprise Malaysia. In Indonesia, the Chinese are only 3%, so that is not a problem. SB.- With the exception of President Habibie, you are the first one to say it is not a problem. It seems to be a problem for every other politician. JW.- The topic has been overblown by saying that they own 70% of the GDP, but that is nonsense. They might have 50 to 60%, or even 70% of the private sector, but the private sector in only 35% of Indonesia’s GDP. The state alone is already 50%, and foreign companies account for 10 to 15%. So in the end, “70%” is just 20%. SB.- So what is the point of saying that the Chinese control Indonesia’s economy when it is nonsense? JW.- It's a belief, and it has been perpetuated. Politically, it is convenient to blame everything on the Chinese. The naked truth is that there are less than a hundred Chinese controlled conglomerates that are really big and powerful in a country of 200 million souls. In West Kalimantan, the Chinese Indonesians are poor people. They were farmers before, crop farmers, working on rubber trees and so on. When the rebellion happened in 1967-68, they were decimated and pushed into the background. They couldn’t even work. They were just miserable farmers! Today, there are about 80% of poor people among the Chinese. They came here in the beginning to work in mines during the gold rush in the nineteenth century as coolies, and they are not really much better off now. SB.-An average is not a very good benchmark. Is it true that 3% of the people, what we could call the Chinese community, control 20 to 30% of the economy? JW.- Yes, it is true. So, in relative terms, 3% of the people having 20% or 30% of the economy is still big, no doubt about that, but it is not overwhelming. The important question is: are you considering these ethnic Chinese your own people or not? Is this a fundamental problem of the Republic or not? If it is, what the hell is the problem? If you give it to foreigners, why the hell don’t you want to give it to Indonesians, even though they are of Chinese extraction? SB.- There is no doubt that they have greatly contributed to Indonesia and are of a great importance for the wellbeing of the country. But as in any argument based on ethnic difference, history weighs heavily in the mind of the people. Indonesians find the Chinese Indonesian overbearing, and not loyal. Maybe that is a misconception, but it does play a part. JW.- Of course, one can't avoid looking at the background of our history. The Chinese were never on the side of the Republic. Before, they were compradores (middlemen). They have always been resented like, say, the Huguenots in France in the XVIIth century. The fact that the Chinese are scapegoats is a residue of the colonial history compounded into the political situation. SB.- President Habibie says they have been hijacked. JW.- Yes, to a certain extent, they became a tool of Soeharto, who never recognized them. In an article I wrote I compare them to the concubines: enjoyed, but never recognized. Soeharto agreed that we had to have an assimilation process like in Thailand, where after two generations, the Chinese are now completely assimilated. As you know, Chuan Leekpai (the Prime Minister) is of Chinese extraction. Soeharto agreed, made a decree, but didn’t implement it. No Chinese could go into public life. SB.- However you are of Chinese origin, and you had a number of official appointments in Soeharto's governments for nearly 20 years. You were also a high-ranking Golkar official and a four time MRP representative. JW.- I was the exception, because I was a student leader that opposed Soekarno. I was on the street with Soeharto for six months. But the average Chinese wouldn’t get a chance to get into political life, or the civil service, or the military. We have been confined to business. The Chinese became a very nice scapegoat. Every time Soeharto was saying: “I have to give this to my kids, because we have to favour Pribumis (Indigenous Malay)”. As you mentioned, there is a fault line in history. Most of the Chinese Indonesian were apolitical, but some were closer to the Dutch, and very few were on the Republican side. When Indonesia was created, it only left prejudice. SB.- And then you have the religious factor… JW.- Yes, it is a very Muslim country too, and most Chinese are not Muslim. That also is a factor to be considered. Still, it is mainly a political problem. SB.- Can a thirty two years' legacy be erased easily? How can the myth of the Chinese controlling the fate of the Pribumis be destroyed? JW.- It will take time. It cannot come exclusively from the top. It would not be enough. We have to get that to the level of the ordinary citizens. So it is a matter of growth strategy. Our growth has to be inclusive. SB.- There are serious doubts that Indonesia can achieve a 8-9% growth rate before quite a while. JW.- I don't think we will have a strong growth but it is less a problem than some think. Seven to nine percent growth creates gaps and sustained problems of environment, damage to resources like water supply and so forth. Therefore, it is much better if we have a growth with all the grass roots included. Five or six percent growth is in such a case perfectly adequate. It is one of the lessons we have learned for the longer term. SB.- The government now focus on the so-called "People's Economy" rather than large projects. One of your colleagues, Dr. Nasution, is very critical of Minister Sasono's program and so is Gus Dur, for many different reasons. JW.- The problem with Adi Sasono’s program is that it might have a political agenda: to win the election. What the government is saying to the indigenous ordinary citizens is “now I give you the money. We have got rid of the Chinese, it is your turn, and next time, if you elect me, I’ll give you more”. Such a program has to be balanced. In economic terms, you can’t only distribute, you have to produce, otherwise it is impossible. Today the resources are coming not from the revenues, but from the outside, from the IMF, and the government can distribute the money. But once the foreign help dries up, it will not be easy anymore. What will happen the next fiscal year? The aid program will not be coming from the IMF but from second line, that means on bilateral terms with foreign countries, who have many obligations too. In the meantime, Korea, Russia, Brazil have all plunged. It will take a much more strenuous efforts to get the aid. SB.- Yes, but you have to go one step at a time. In essence, for the 1999-2000 fiscal year, the funding is there and everyone wants to be sure that it is not going to be mismanaged and that loans don't leak… JW.- It is indeed a concern. The World Bank said thirty percent of the funds it gives are still being corrupted. I don’t understand. People are dying and people are stealing. What I can say is that we have had a good base, but there is no more house; basically, we have to build it all over again. SB- Do you think that Indonesia is currently vulnerable enough to external forces? JW.- There might be some money flowing in. You know, it is easy to bring a suitcase in this country. But of course, it is the indigenous domestic part of extreme elements that are the real worry. In general, Islam, which is the religion of at least 85% of the people, will definitely have an impact on the future of Indonesia, its openness and its social development. No doubt it will have a bearing on democracy. The problem for us, the minorities, is to know if the Muslims, whatever their tendency, adhere to democracy and pluralism, which are our guarantees, or not. That is critical. There is a debate among them, and some are very plural, like Gus Dur. We trust him completely. For us, we regret his health problem (10), otherwise he would become the next president. But there are others outside the main stream, like Amien Rais. We must not discard him, and support his effort to create a national party that would reach out of the Muhammadia (11). Then we have Ms. Megawati’s movement (PDI), which is made of Muslim followers also, with a nationalist ideology, which incorporated many of the alienated people from the old regime. That is why PDI is quite comfortable. It can channel their grievance of being alienated and left behind. She has good grassroots support, especially in Bali and Java. Last July she held a congress in Bali: one million people came on their own. They were not paid, and they were well organized. There were fifty “Centres” as they call them, set up to prepare groups to go to Bali. SB.- If such parties have overwhelming support, why do you worry that President Habibie will seek the support of Golkar or the armed forces (ABRI) since he stands no chance, according to your picture? JW.-Narrow groups around Habibie, some groups in the Administration, some in the Golkar might support him. Some elements of other parties might give him the benefit of the doubt. Some say: “we will wait until the (Presidential) election is organized. We won’t get rid of you now because we need an election to get a legitimate government, but after that, our support is finished.” One very important and influential scholar, Nurcholish Madjid, told Habibie several times: “do not try to be reelected, because you are the continuation of Soeharto. In the end, you lack legitimacy.” SB.- Yes, but after the election? JW.- ………… (no answer). SB.- On the economic front, it seems that the government has regained some sort of control and that the downward cycle has reached the bottom. JW.- There is no real movement in the economy. It is at total standstill. Besides the money from the IMF, all the rest is just gimmicks. SB.- Can a transitional government launch a major initiative? If it did, you would decry it as being the work of an illegitimate government. If it does just enough but not much more, it is accused of being too weak. The feeling is that whatever President Habibie does or does not do, it is wrong. JW.- That issue was discussed in May and June 98. People were of the opinion that we needed a totally new government. The thinking was that if you don’t solve the political problem first, nothing is going to be done on the economic front. The IMF, the US government, the G7, or whatever, disagreed. Their view was that we are going to get a legitimate government after the election anyhow. In the meantime, we have a transition and Habibie will deal with the daily problems. The most important problem was the safety net to be organized for the people that had been crushed by the crisis. SB.- To a certain extent, you had the arsonists telling you how to put out the fire… JW.- Exactly. That is why Habibie, in my opinion, cannot handle the situation. SB.- So far, he seems not to have put a foot wrong and things are moving in the right direction… JW.- Well, it is true that he used all the gimmicks in a fine way: releasing prisoners, giving freedom to the press, moving on East Timor etc, all the things that Soeharto never wanted to do, so some found Habibie very fresh. But when it comes to the real things, nothing moves. On the political side, the killings, the looting still continue, the report on the May riots did not come out, the rape case did not go anywhere, killings in East Java are the same, the religious issue has not been overcome, the Indonesian Chinese problem has not been overcome. The real situation hasn’t changed, including the economy. The debt restructuring has not happened yet, the banks restructuring has not happened, and the security problem is everywhere in the press, everyday. Looting, killing, civil war in Aceh again, East Timor and so on, so how do you get people to come? SB.- If public security is a concern for all, and there are many parties which have their fingers in it, one has the feeling that on the economic front, the issues are complex because the plunge of the rupiah has ballooned the debt beyond the imagination… JW.- My feeling so far is that we see here only a survival effort on the private sector side, not much else. SB- What should be done to put the economy back on tracks? JW.- Number one is restructuring the banks otherwise, there is no blood. SB.- The government agrees with you on that point… JW.- But it is hesitating because of politics. The problem is that they have prepared a restructuring of the banking system, but have a lot of hassle with it, because besides the state banks, which are not really effective and efficient, the banking system is mainly Indonesian Chinese. SB.- You have the racial factor again: the recapitalization means giving money to the Chinese and before the election that is a red flag that might play into the hands of fringe parties? JW.- That is right. SB.- Then can you blame the government for being cautious in a pre-electoral period where people are desperate to sell any political slogan sometimes at the price of a riot? JW.- The biggest stupidity was to close the 16 banks in the first place (12). The IMF made a blunder, because now the banking system is kaput. Everybody got the money out, so the government has to sustain all the banks with extra loans. In turn all the Chinese banks are kaput, because they have to sell their shares and their assets to the state banks or somebody else. SB.- Why do you think the closure of the banks was handled so carelessly? Is it just because the government could not say "no" to the IMF, or other motives were at stake which confused the issue? JW.- My belief is that, in the beginning, the government thought it was an opportunity to get rid of the Chinese once and for all. They were mislead, and when they realized there was nobody to buy the assets, that the factories were not running and there were no buyers, that no one was willing to buy real estate, they had to compromise and grant four years to the Chinese banks to sell their assets. Then you had a lot of confusion, which is the mark of political wrangling. When Indofood, owned by Bank Central Asia (13), came with a good scheme where 30% of the company was sold to First Pacific Hong Kong, the government intervened because First Pacific Hong Kong is also controlled by a Chinese Indonesian. But where do they expect the cash to come from? Ultimately, it was sorted out, but it does not bode well for the restructuring of the banking industry. In that sector, in the beginning, the government said that they would get rid of the technocrats who, in their view, had created the problem. But they missed the point. Do they think the State banks can run the private banks? No way! They are in worse shape and much less efficient. The best option is to give the Chinese some minority shares and let them stay, because nobody else can do their job. They have trained everyone in the banking sector. It is a fact. That political haggling is at the core of the discussion and that is why the restructuring has not yet happened. As you see, there is no way you can sort all these things out before sorting out the political problem. SB.- What opinion do you have on the job the IMF has done in Indonesia? JW.- They tried to transfer here their way of dealing with different problems in Latin America. But it was a completely different situation: no high inflation, no big deficit in the budget, no state loan. They made many blunders. SB.- What can they do to amend the blunder? JW.- To fight them would be detrimental. Now they have to get involved in the bank restructuring. In the beginning, the IMF didn’t want to see the problem, because of its political colour, the corruption and so on. We had to tell them: "this is not the problem of a few Chinese being saved, the problem is to know whether you would ever like the banking system to be on its feet again." They reacted negatively, stopping the money inflow for one week. That was not very helpful. Then Habibie signed a decree granting four years instead of one year for the sale of assets. What could have been done in a year? It was unrealistic. There are many fields where there is a real need for a impartial arbiter, because otherwise there is the obvious risk of going on the wrong direction. Unfortunately, all this is being very politicized. SB.- When we look at the budget and the deficit which will be covered by the IMF and other donors, the feeling is that the IMF has the key to the election, for if it slows the delivery of the funds as it did in the past, then the government policies are in total jeopardy and so are the chances of the President to be elected if he runs. Isn't that true? JW.- That is true in a way. If the budget is going to unravel before the election, then there will be no election. The IMF has the key to the unraveling of the budget. SB.- So far, all the signs are that the IMF is very pleased with the budget and its relation with the present government. It allows more flexibility and seems to recognize that it can't run Indonesia. Maybe it is due to other pressing issues, such as the Brazilian problem, or maybe it is due to the fact that it has taken the measure of President Habibie and are getting confident that he can do a reasonable job in the right direction? JW.- It may not have been the IMF's intention in the beginning, because its officers thought he was a transition man anyhow. However you have a lot of people around Habibie who would like to continue. Now the IMF has to reckon that Habibie is possibly going to be reelected. The US government and a lot of people are dreading this possibility because then stability will never be achieved. SB.- But if the IMF and the US government are dreading the possibility, they have the tools to shoot down the budget, which will torpedo the government, if your assumptions are right. JW.- I think they are too worried about chaos. Indonesia is a big country. And there are other factors at play that do not need the IMF involvement. The optimistic picture drawn by Habibie about the economy is not correct. The economy is still not under control at all. However the government says the GDP growth will be 0%, compared to minus 13% at least in the 1998/1999 fiscal year. Indonesia needs a minimum of 5% growth just to get the young reaching the work force employed. It means with 0%, you get at least another four million people unemployed on top of what you already have. The question is can we sustain it without further disorder? SB.- Can you indeed? JW.- Our people are so resilient and patient, particularly the Javanese that I can't say. Java is the most affected by the economic downturn. But out of Java, there is more agriculture: plantations, rubber, real goods. They have all this traditional economy plus mineral resources, coal energy and so forth. The irony is that we are going back into our own history. The economic situation was, when Soeharto took power, quite similar. Java was poor and the outlying islands were better off. But to sustain Java, all the money was going to the centre. That is why the outlying islands went into rebellion. Then to avoid such a situation, Soeharto started to develop Java into the industrial centre of Indonesia. The wealth became incredible, and so the pressure was released. But today we have at the centre a total collapse and by comparison the outlying islands are thriving because of their commodities, their nickel, their oil, their gold mines etc… SB.- Is that why President Habibie, a Sulawanese, is so keen to push for the decentralization of the state, just to avoid a new and inevitable strife if the outlying islands have once again to bail out Java? JW.- There is no question that the system was too centralized before. So now the problem is tense and you have to give power to the provinces. However the question of how much power the centre gives has still to be discussed. SB.- But the process is already in motion. Provinces can export direct. JW.- Yes, but the bureaucracy is still very much centralized since you have to come to Java to get any license. We will have to change all that. SB.- Is 1999 going to be a critical year, a turning point not only for Indonesia but also for ASEAN where Indonesia is playing an important role, either as a stabilizing force or a destabilizing one? JW.- 1999 is going to be critical in all senses. In ASEAN, you have a round of new leaders who don’t know each other very well (14). Therefore we will have a difficult period of adjustment. Some are old leaders, like Mahathir, and some of the new leaders are completely different in terms of philosophy, outlook, experience and all that. Thus we are facing another burden there. The concern is that the lowest common denominator is going to prevail and decide what the ASEAN is going to do. According to me, we need a lot more of integration. There is no other way. The European Union is my model. We need more rule and institutional base, otherwise we will never get together. If we are not building intra, interstate regionalism, which was ASEAN before, into a community, then we are not going to be integrated and will never get the real benefit of this cooperation. For the time being, I don’t expect the governments will tackle this, because each has its own problems it wants to solve first. Indonesia particularly, who is the informal leader of ASEAN, is not going to be involved for the time being. I always argue with my friends, the academics, the think-tanks, the non-governmental agencies (NGOs), the private sector, the businessmen, that they should take over, because we cannot expect the governments, the rulers, to take the lead. One hope is that we are starting to have a lot of integration at the NGO level. SB.- Two years ago, globalization was supposed to solve all our problems. It was the next nirvana. Today, the world is facing crisis after crisis which affects the livelihood of the largest class of each affected country. Do you think that globalization is a flawed concept? JW.- More than ever we have to face this huge problem of globalization. ASEAN might not have a critical mass anymore, because of this crisis. Therefore we need a bigger entity. In fact, my view is that the East Asian Summit (EAS) that was just held in Hanoi might be the most interesting model, as the core for all the regional institutions in the future. We are not going to build another institution again. We have to push the East Asian Summit as a consultation and policies coordination entity, like the G7. It is not going to be another institution. APEC is enough, and it is the most important. The problem is we need a core in APEC to push the policies. In the next few years, we should include Australia and New Zealand, besides the thirteen members, for political reasons. Otherwise they won’t have their say in the problems. Australia and New Zealand have always been good regionalists. They have to become part of Asia. From the beginning, I have always been a proponent to include them in ASEM on the Asian side. But we will have to wait until Mahathir steps down, because he is adamantly against it. His argument is to say that geographically they don’t belong to Asia. I told him that, politically and economically, they do belong. But he doesn’t want to listen. SB.- They don't share the so-called Asian values, whatever they are, but are rather the proponents of a very orthodox western view of the world and capitalism, and what one would describe as the American philosophy on geopolitical issues. Could that be the real issue there? JW.- It's true. On the other hand, we have China which is just building on Mahathir's views, because that country has always been worried about foreign interventions in its domestic affairs. But New Zealand and Australia have always been very creative and positive members of the region (15). Notes: 1.- The Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) is an American funded public policy research institution, founded in 1962. Its headquarter is located in Washington, D.C. The chairman of the board of Trustees is Sam Nunn, former American senator. The regional headquarter is based at Honolulu. There is around the Pacific a network of 20 local branches. 2.- See biography. Jusuf Wanandi was a high-ranking Golkar official and a four time member of the DPR. 3.- The study was commissioned in 1994. It was done by the Indonesian Institute of Social Sciences (LIPI) whose head of international and regional affairs in 1997 was Dr. Dewi Fortuna Anwar, today a close confident of President Habibie. The study was completed by January 1996. However it didn't get past State Secretary Moerdiono, who was then President Soeharto's chief aide, but with the support of President Habibie, it became the blue-print of the current electoral laws. At the time, Marzuki Darusma, deputy chairman of the Indonesian Commission on Human Rights, was quoted as saying that decentralization would be the way to go. The government is now trying to shift power to the provinces. As for Dr Anwar, she only said that the study didn't create anything new because all the system existed. 4.- So far all the legal hurdles have been overcome. The electoral laws were passed end of January. 5.- It is interesting to note that Golkar was not unanimous on the matter. Jusuf Wanandi is here lumping the government and Golkar together as the opponents to such a motion, but President Habibie made clear that he considered it essential that civil servants be barred from political activities. And Golkar was badly split on the issue. 6.- General Wiranto said that the military will remain neutral and so far it is the case. 7.- See interview with President Habibie. Although Jusuf Wanadi's remarks are completely irrelevant since the reforms that President Habibie has been pushing have established a platform for a free and fair election, we decided to publish them because they show the gap that we have between the rhetoric and the reality. As President Habibie said: "Truth is not what matters at that stage". 8.- This is a reference to the reshuffle of January 5th, 1999 with the promotion of Lt Gen. Sugiono being promoted to the post of ABRI Chief of General Affairs, replacing Lt. Gen. Fachrul Razi, and with Lt. Gen. Johny Lumintang taking over Sugiono's previous position of Deputy Army Chief of Staff. 9.- Development Unity Party (PPP), one of the three recognized parties under Soeharto's regime. It was a federation of former Islamic parties and it is not clear today what is its strength since a dozen Muslim parties will context the election. 10.- Abdurrahmann Wahid is nearly blind. 11.- See note in Abdurrahmann Wahid's interview in this issue. 12.- In October 1998, the Rupiah had sunk to 3,500 rupiah for one dollar. To impress markets and investors, the IMF argued that what was needed was a clean-up of the banking sector. It asked for the closure of a number of banks. The government, reluctant at first, agreed under pressure to close 16 banks: Harapan Sentosa, Andormeda, Pacific, Astria Raya, Guna Internasional, Dwipa Semesta, Kosagraha Semesta, Industri, Jakarta, Citrahasta D, South East Asia, Mataram Dhanata, Pinaesaan, Anrico, Umum Majapahit and Sejahtera Bank Umum. 9,000 employees were laid off. Instead of sending a positive signal, the closure of the banks, at least two of which argued that they were not insolvent, led to growing panic. It was the start of the unraveling of the rupiah. 13.- The Salim group, a Chinese-owned conglomerate. 14.- If it is true that governments have changed, it is hard to distinguish new from old faces. In Malaysia, the people are the same (except Anwar Ibrahim), in Thailand, the Prime Minister Chuan has been in and out of power during the last decade, in Singapore Goh has been Prime Minister since 1990 and in the Philippines, President Estrada was the Vice-President. Part of his government is still the same, in particular in Foreign Affairs and Finance. There is in that comment the birth of a myth, the myth that the crisis brought to power new people with new ideas, that it opened the door to a more efficient democracy. The truth is that it did not bring, so far, deep changes. 15.- That position fits with the United States' view on the subject. published in winter 1999. | |||
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