Never Mind Principles: I want to be President!

Politics is back. The eye is still on the big prize, but political campaigning of a sort is underway. After the Prosperous Justice Party grabbed some of the limelight with a TV ad portraying ex-president Suharto as a national hero, the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle has joined the fray. It has been running ads in the papers promising cheap groceries for those little people it purports to support. The idea is of course to ensure that ex-president Megawati Sukarnoputri gets another go at the job. Never mind that in her previous term in office, she conspicuously failed to do anything for the little people (staying silent when Indonesian workers were expelled from Malaysia and only reluctantly visiting Bali after the 2002 bomb killed 38 Indonesians in the province that is home to her most loyal supporters). One of her most shameless acts was to help ensure retired general Sutiyoso won a second term as Jakarta governor despite the fact he was military commander of Jakarta in 1996 when troops stormed the offices of Megawati's breakaway wing of her party, killing many of her devoted followers. Then, according to one story, after her defeat she tried to sabotage the state budget by removing subsidies FOR THE POOR to make things difficult for her successor, but was talked out of it.

And now she may be up to her old opportunist tricks again. Rumors abound that she is considering retired general Subianto Prabowo as her running mate, despite the fact he was commander of the Kopassus "special forces" troops allegedly involved in the disappearances of pro-democracy activists (including her supporters!) in the last days of Suharto's regime. If it's not Prabowo (a really nasty piece of work if there ever was one), could she really be thinking of teaming up with Golkar? It was during Golkar's heyday in power that she was deposed as leader of her party as she was getting too popular.

But forget the little people, forget what her new friends did to those who stood by her in the dark days of the New Order. The important thing is to get to the palace and spend another term cutting ribbons and doing little else.

By the way, if she does win, look out for a constitutional crisis if she wants to stay in office for a second term. Article 7 of the Constitution states, "The President and Vice President hold office for a term of five years and can afterwards be elected to the same office, for one other term only", but she didn't serve a full term first time....