The National Interest
Fall 2001

Another Year of Living Dangerously?

by Rajan Menon

 

. . . A state capable of knitting concord from discord, implementing (not merely proclaiming) reform, and restoring order is what Indonesia has needed to stanch the economic crisis, secessionism and communal butchery that increasingly threaten to undo it. Alas, such a state is precisely what Indonesia has lacked. What it had from October 1999 to July of this year was a tragicomic government personified by President Abdurrahman Wahid. Virtually blind, frail and given to inconsistent Delphic utterances, he became the feckless leader of an entropic government.

Erudite, a proponent of tolerance and long a respected religious and political leader, Wahid personified the aphorism that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. To preserve Indonesia, he offered ceasefires and autonomy to rebellious regions. The offerings failed to appease separatists, but they did convince the military and both Islamist and nationalist parties that he was destroying the country on the installment plan. Indeed, Wahid’s political instincts were peculiar, and sowed confusion. To end Aceh’s war, he proposed a referendum, but later depicted the idea as a personal opinion. He decreed that the Morning Star, West Papua’s long-illegal banner of independence, could be flown, but only below the Indonesian flag. He continued visiting the Middle East and North Africa as Madurese were being slaughtered in Kalimantan, saying that the chaos was under control and had been exaggerated.

The popular support Wahid enjoyed upon taking up the presidency was eventually shredded by the weakness of Indonesia’s economy and the pandemonium that is its politics. Charges of incompetence and allegations of corruption led to censure by the parliament, which summoned a session of the mpr in 2001 to remove him, advancing the conclave from August to July once Wahid threatened extreme measures. With the armed forces and the police refusing to support him, Wahid’s threats to declare an emergency, suspend parliament and call new elections proved mere bluster. He stood friendless in Jakarta’s political arena and was replaced by Megawati Sukarnoputri, with whom his relationship can most charitably be described as having been frosty. Wahid’s political demise was a foregone conclusion—to everyone but himself—and his efforts to cling to office by threatening martial law and hinting at demonstrations by his supporters combined pathos with political psychosis. . . .