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How the once-popular PDIP looses its popularity?

4/11/04

In the 1999 election, the PDIP (Indonesian Democratic Party-Struggle) managed to be on top with 34% of the votes. In this year election, the party will possibly obtain only about 20% of the votes (see table below). In less than five years, the once popular party is losing its popularity drastically. What went wrong?

Its close connection to the resurgence of the military power and influence aside, what people dislike of the party is its wobbly commitment to combat corruption, revamp the judicial system and to provide an acceptable solution to the nation’s socio-economic problems — three of the nation’s most fundamental challenges.

The diminishing of “Megawati factor”, a phenomenon that has elevated the party in 1990s, is also another contributing factor to the erosion of the party’s reputation. Objectively, without the name of Soekarno, Megawati would unlikely be able to energize millions of folks and rise to her current post as president. The name of Soekarno, just like Kennedy in the US, is still an aura. Moreover, with the crisis of national leadership in the late 90s, millions of people were suddenly dreaming of Soekarno, the nation’s first and the charismatic president. “No father,” shouted some folks, “the daughter is ok as well.” After all, Indonesia is not a unique case. Pakistan and Philippines have already elected the daughters of their former national leaders to lead their countries.

But the aura of a name has its limit. While some people might still find it appealing and put their sentiment before their rationality, others have begun to question the capability of the individual who carries the legacy of the name in leading a troubled country. Most of their concerns are, ironically, due to the performance of Megawati herself. Specifically they question her tendency to distance from the folks, the same folks who really view her as their partner in their struggle for a better life.

Regardless of one’s view about Soeharto, the former president had something good to offer: his town-hall meetings. Undoubtedly, those meetings were highly ceremonial, heavily bureaucratic and very costly.  But at the very least people could see him talking candidly, always with his repetitive word “daripada”, and answering people’s questions with smiles. People could form their judgment about his communication skills and his understanding of the nation’s problems. It would be naïve to assume that the questions asked to him were spontaneous. But even in a pre-arranged questions-and-answers environment communication skills are still greatly needed, something that people cannot see from Megawati.

As a national leader, and as the leader of the PDIP, Megawati must not hide, but she should come forward; should not distance herself from the public discourse, but should express and emphasize her strengths and vision in leading the country. Put simply, it is at those opportunities Megawati could define herself as a leader, not as someone who just happened to inherit a legacy. What is really lack of the Megawati’s leadership, as many are questioning, is the leadership itself: who is really in charge?

This is because people rarely see her speak of her mind about the nation’s challenges and her vision and strengths in responding to the challenges. Whether people agree or disagree with her vision and strengths, it is a secondary issue. Reasonable people will evaluate her objectively and those who strongly dislike her would probably never like her anyway, regardless of her public appearance. Had Megawati followed Soeharto’s food-step and made the meetings less ceremonial, less bureaucratic, less costly, more spontaneous, and more on substance, her popularity would have been higher than what she has today.

The third factor causing the erosion of the PDIP’s popularity is the failure of the party to carry out an internal reform. Built upon the disfranchised PDI (Indonesian Democratic Party) in 1993, joint subsequently by several military generals, idealistic figures such as Kwik Kian Gie and Frans Seda and party crossers, especially from Golkar, and inspired by its proclaim as a grass-root party with a nationalism ideology, the PDIP was once a party of hope in 1999, at least for more than 30 percent of the voters. With a strong leadership, good national policies and a sound internal recruitment strategy, the party could have garnered a higher percentage of votes in the 2004 elections. But today’s reality is different. While the party has failed miserably on the first two aspects, it is almost doomed at the latter. For the last four year, the party has been unsuccessful in developing an internal reform both of which involves ideas and regeneration process.  

This failure is very likely due to the intention of the party’s elite to keep the status quo. But keeping a status quo has often been, if not always, a sign of regress rather than progress.  The party’s elite apparently has missed that time and environment have changed. And while the environment has changed, the PDIP is still operating under the old paradigm: try to convince people at the last minute by using the old method — a politics of money and power. The new paradigm already suggests that only through a good preparation and only by using a politics of ideas and persuasion, a party can build its credential and win the people’s votes. The some extend, the Democratic Party (PD) and the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) have reaped the results of such approach.

Lastly, the party’s ideas and recruitment strategy have also failed miserably in attracting the intellectuals and business people of the young generations. Instead, the party is still relying heavily on the old crack politicians, the party’s elite and a couple of politicians who joint it after leaving their former parties.

Eventually, a good and strong party must have a strong intellectual base. If it is mainly based on “grass-root”, claiming itself to be a party of “wong cilik”, and if it is dominated by the old cracks politicians, its fate has been sealed: a marginal party. Many of the party’s national and local elites are lacking of real commitment to promote the nation’s and their region’s interest. And many of them are not intellectually refreshing and challenging.

Now the party finds itself in trouble. It lacks not only ideas, but also human resources. Megawati’s presidency looks like to end permanently in 2004. They need a partner and it seems they found it in Akbar — and Golkar. While both parties might benefit from their prospective cooperation, the losers are clearly the people. It would have been better off for the PDIP, and for the nation as well, had the party launched productive initiatives to improve its reputation. Alas, regret is always too late, if they do regret.

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