This must be the age of foolishness, madness and despair.
When the House of Representatives quickly gathered and overturned on Wednesday (August 21) a ruling by the Constitutional Court that gives more freedom for people to run in regional elections only in two hours of meeting, we are totally convinced now that these politicians have bad faith, can’t be trusted and have betrayed people who voted for them.
We know it’s time to take a stand and resist.
We should know that such a political move was taken only to serve Joko “Jokowi” Widodo, and his family members because if the Constitutional Court’s ruling stands, Jokowi’s son, Kaesang Pangarep, can’t run in the gubernatorial election in Central Java as he is not old enough. The invalidation of the ruling also serves Jokowi’s goal of preventing Anies Baswedan to run in Jakarta gubernatorial election, which will open for candidate registration on August 29, or just a week from now. The court’s ruling has opened possibility for the Indonesia Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) to carry Anies, the man Jokowi perceives as a threat to him and his family, to run for Jakarta governor, and possibly for president in 2029 elections.
How can these politicians be united to go against public sentiment and risk of angering many, if not most people, to serve Jokowi’s interests? The answer is simple: most, if not all, of them are corrupt, and Jokowi has hold them hostage, blackmailing them with the cases, and readying the police, the prosecutors and the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) to detain them.
If any or some of them are clean then there should have been some resistance to this orchestration. But as the public witnessed it, there has been no fight at all.
These politicians must have been scared by what happened to Airlangga Hartarto, who was only last week still the chairman of Golkar Party, the country’s second largest party, which has long history and experienced and seasoned politicians as its member.
Jokowi’s possibly most spectacular and shocking move was when he put Golkar Party under his control by allegedly blackmailing its chairman Airlangga Hartarto, with corruption cases and sex tape, and forcing him to resign his post, and then moving up the party’s national convention to vote for his replacement from the scheduled date in December to this week (August) to allow it to be held while he is still the president.
The party’s convention today (August 21) voted to elect Bahlil Lahadalia, Jokowi’s current energy and natural resources minister, and also his most trusted loyalist, as the party chairman without any meaningful resistance from its senior members although some of them criticized the takeover.
Considering Golkar’s history, figures and influence, this takeover is as smooth as can be. Possibly because what has been inflicted to Airlangga has spooked all of the party’s politicians who one way or another have corruption or other criminal cases against them.
After a failed attempt to take over former president and his predecessor Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s Partai Demokrat (Democratic Party) via his chief of staff and close ally, General (ret) Moeldoko, Jokowi, who is well aware that he needs a major political party to survive after his reign as the president ends, learned his lesson and really demonstrated not only his authorities but also his willingness to use it for his goals regardless whatever ethics and laws he violated.
Various media, politicians and observers have speculated that Airlangga has been blackmailed using his alleged corruption cases and sex tape, with some suggested that the prosecutors from the Attorney General’s Office came to his house, and showed him the arrest letter and ready to bring him in in the night prior to his resignation.
As the president, Jokowi should bring Airlangga to justice so that he would be investigated and brought to trial in accordance to the due process of law rather than using the evidence to blackmail him. To make it more ironic, Airlangga are invited to the palace to receive medal of honor for the president in the following day for his service to the country.
If it is true that Jokowi used the evidence to blackmail Airlangga, then he was much worse – doing bigger crime — than the former Golkar chairman himself.
Dangerous Precedence and Culture of Impunity
Between April 24 when Prabowo Subianto was declared as Indonesia’s president-elect to October 20 when he will officially take over the presidency from outgoing President Jokowi is arguably the longest time and the most dangerous period for Indonesia throughout its history.
And it’s only the dying six months.
Jokowi, who is supposed to be a lame duck president, has been busier than he was in the last five years of his presidency, except perhaps during the most recent presidential elections. He has been using every possible and impossible ways to conserve and solidify his power, making sure he will be protected after he passed the presidency to Prabowo, and his family members occupy high posts powerful enough to seal them from any threats while playing determining roles in the country’s politics years to come.
Beside taking over Golkar, in the first four months since April 24, Jokowi has tempered with laws, elections for governors, mayors and regents, and taking over Golkar Party, while bribing religious organizations with coal mine concession to get their support.
He has reshuffled his cabinet three times, accommodating his supporters for ministerial posts and other high positions, and appeasing Prabowo, the man he would hope to protect him and preserve his legacy in the aftermath of his reign, and would be replaced by his son, vice president-elect Gibran Rakabuming Raka.
Jokowi has also been allegedly involved with regional elections, trying to insert his other son, Kaesang Pangarep, in races for governor, or vice governor either in Jakarta or in Central Java, and his son-in-law Bobby Nasution in North Sumatra, while making sure that Anies Baswedan, who has been defeated by Prabowo in the presidential showdown, can’t run in Jakarta gubernatorial election.
In his attempt to further get protection from powerful actors, Jokowi after allocating ministerial posts to members of Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) and Muhammadiyah, the country’s two biggest Islamic organizations, decided to distribute coal mining concessions to any religious organizations which are willing to take it, with these two Islamic organizations for various reasons, accepting the offer regardless how vastly inexperienced these organizations in handling coal mining.
The impact is immediate as Ansor, NU’s youth wing, subsequently issued a public announcement warning that whoever hurts Jokowi, they hurt all of them.
From now to October is only two months, but in that period, Jokowi can do anything unthinkable. It’s time for people with decency to unite and put up a resistance to stop this madness.
Jokowi is dangerous mainly because he practices a way that so far works for him by resorting to any way possible despite breaking ethics and laws. He has developed a precedence or a culture of ignorance. His end justifies any means possible.
He, therefore, has developed a precedence that can be copied by the following presidents, especially Prabowo, who will take over the power in October.
If Jokowi can get away with all his destructive moves, then it will set an example that it is fine to do all these destructions – from destroying democracy to unaccounted foreign debts of IDR 9,000 trillions that put heavy burdens to next generations to environmental destruction and waste of money and destruction of people’s livelihood in his various big projects.
To highlight the impact of Jokowi’s unaccountability, Prabowo has already hinted that he would increase the country’s debt to finance his programs.
Indonesia has allowed to many elites – current and past – to live with impunity. It’s time for us to stand against such impunity to allow the nation to move forward.
