The Golkar debacle and the rise of a new political culture Tobias Basuki ;   A researcher at the department of politics and international relations at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, Jakarta

JAKATA POST, 06 Desember 2014

                                                                                                                       

The success of Aburizal Bakrie in maintaining his hold over the Golkar Party marks a surprising new development for the party’s possible future form. The internal struggle within Golkar is also a proxy battle in a wider political arena. How the Golkar debacle eventually turns out will indicate new developments and shape the new political landscape five years ahead. Aburizal’s display of power to push for and eventually control his version of Golkar’s national congress in Bali was to some extent a surprise. It is quite a political tradition within Golkar for all of its elites to gang up and oust its chairman after a failure to win an election. Golkar elites used to champion a new leader and oust its losing leader to join the new incoming government. Golkar had never been in opposition and its structure had always seemed to be very fearful to be in the uncharted territory outside the government. A “new” Golkar immediately after the reforms in 1999 was led by Akbar Tandjung. Factionalism within Golkar is nothing new. During the transition period Akbar leaned toward supporting Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) chair Megawati Soekarnoputri for the 2004 presidential election. Jusuf Kalla, then another strong political figure within the party, ran as running mate to Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. After Yudhoyono-Kalla won the election, a similar parliamentary deadlock and struggle to what we observe now was seen in 2004. Soon by the end of 2004 Kalla had most of the bandwagon of Golkar’s elite with him (including Aburizal). He ousted Akbar and took control of Golkar. Hence, Golkar was “saved” from being in opposition, drew away from the PDI-P and joined the government. In the 2009 election Kalla ran on his own ticket for president, challenging Yudhoyono as incumbent. When Kalla lost, immediately Aburizal, Akbar and Agung Laksono joined forces to oust him. They were dubbed the “Triple A” alliance, which agreed to install Aburizal as chairman for the 2009 to 2014 period. The tradition of the Golkar elites ganging up on and immediately discarding its beaten leaders to keep Golkar within the cushy circle of a ruling coalition in the past functioned almost like clockwork. Thus the recent development in which Aburizal consolidated his position of controlling Golkar is quite outside of the norm. Golkar is the oldest political party that has always and will probably continue to color and shape Indonesian politics even from the sidelines. Its roots and tentacles in Indonesian politics cannot be understated. From the 1999 election, amidst the reform euphoria and anti-New Order sentiment, up until now Golkar has somehow always managed to retain its strong position, although it was never a victor in the general elections. The percentages it gained in the legislative elections appear to have subsided, from garnering 22 percent in 1999 and 21 in 2004, down to getting 19 and 14 in subsequent elections. This, however, does not indicate the decline of the Golkar-esque influence and its New Order-style tentacles in Indonesia’s political culture. It may seem to have lost some percentage points, but in fact in the broader sense it gained much more. One only needs to point to the flourishing of the new brands that sprang out of Golkar. The Gerindra Party and the Hanura Party were the initial offshoots of Golkar that only began to compete in 2009, the time when Golkar dropped from its strong 20-percent position. Together with the NasDem Party, another offshoot of Golkar, the “Golkar franchise” has never died, but actually expanded in 2014 (in total they garnered about 30 percent). That being said, the so-called strongest coloring of the Golkar-esque style in Indonesian politics has been termed by political scientists as “cartel politics”. In short, it is the beating of the system of democratic checks and balances by opposing political parties through tacit cooperation between the elites. This can be clearly observed to explain several patterns that have never changed up until now. In spite of progress, corruption and government inefficiency is still the name of the game. Second, political parties always join the bandwagon of the winner, as was clearly seen in Yudhoyono’s “fat coalition”. Third, political elites and parties fail to run the natural checks and balances during the reign of fat coalitions. Criticisms, effective policing and the indictment of corruption in the highest levels of the bureaucracy and the political elite only come in effect when the time approaches for a general election. That is the only time window when the unwritten “cartel agreement” to protect each other is suspended as parties and politicians attack each other to gain advantage in the run-up to the elections. As could be seen from 1999 until now, these cartel-like politics were always engineered by Golkar or the New Order “alumni”, which in most recent times was spearheaded by Yudhoyono and Aburizal. But the 2014 elections have seen the rise of a new breed of politicians who have shaken up this political cartel culture. At the national level with President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo and in the capital with Basuki “Ahok” Tjahaja Purnama as governor, the usual “truce” and the reinsertion of the cartel back into its accustomed place seem to have failed. Usually elites and parties immediately ease tensions and much of the politics depart from the limelight and go back to becoming backroom dealings behind closed doors. The presence of Jokowi and Ahok seem to have acted like “new rocks” cracking and shaking the cartel wall. As we see, Ahok in Jakarta has run around head-butting most political parties and Jokowi is occupied with the continuing struggle of running his small ruling coalition. The presence of this so-called new breed of political elite, especially Jokowi, may be part of the reason for the unexpected staying power of Aburizal within Golkar. A large part of the cartel that is now in the Red-and-White Coalition see that the comfortable place of rule they always return to may no longer be home to them. This may be a challenge for Jokowi, but may not be necessarily bad for the long term of Indonesian politics. It may be the first time we have a viable opposition and, as long as challenges are policy- and argument-based, it may lead to effective checks and balances to the government. ●