Not surprisingly, this became the longest article I had written for the Globe at approximately 1400s words.
While was really tempting to say that SBY's presidency was a failure, I had to be objective in this case. I had to evaluate the presidency carefully, paying attention to which ones he could not have done anything had he wanted to and which ones were the missing opportunity.
Thus, I could not put in the hijacking of Indonesian freighter by the Somalian pirates (though it was very tempting to write all the government's missteps that exacerbated the situation) and many more blunders. Still, it was an interesting mind exercise.
Of all the comments, I found Christianto Wibisono's to be the most amusing. He said that no wonder I was not a popular teacher - I was harsher than Pak Fitch in grading Mr. SBY.
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Must Try Harder: Yudhoyono’s School Report Shows Much Room to Improve
Yohanes Sulaiman | December 20, 2011
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| President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono speaking at the Democratic Party's 10th anniversary event on Thursday. (Rumgapres Photo) |
Politics: 2011 was another year of wasted opportunities. With the opposition in disarray due to multiple scandals and misconduct and lawmakers’ popularity at a new low, Yudhoyono could have shown himself to be the only adult in town by being an effective administrator pushing for economic, law enforcement and political reforms.
Instead he was distracted by multiple scandals involving his own political party.
While Yudhoyono remains the most popular politician in Indonesia, Golkar has been working hard behind the scenes to ensure that it wins regional elections and ultimately the national election in 2014. At this juncture, Aburizal Bakrie may succeed in his bid to become the next president thanks to his ability to maintain discipline within Golkar. Grade: C.
Stability: Yudhoyono has a mixed record in maintaining the stability of the country. On one hand, he did a great job in tackling and managing the impact of bombings, preventing them from creating a new panic. In the case of Maluku, so far he has managed to prevent the situation there from degenerating further into an ethno-religious conflict.
Papua remains in turmoil, with the government unable to do much to curb corruption and to address local grievances. The government’s heavy-handed approach in dealing with discontent will hurt in the long run. Grade: B.
Economy: The economy has grown nicely this year, with every macroeconomic indicator in the black.
There are also signs of trouble, however, building on the horizon. Most of the nation’s growth so far has been driven by domestic consumption and international demand for our coal, gas and various other natural resources, which may decline drastically should China enter a period of recession.
There are concerns that all the economic gains do not trickle down to the middle and lower class, creating more inequality.
At the same time, some respected economists, such as Christianto Wibisono, have argued that growth of the Indonesian economy was solely driven by the private sector, with the government doing nothing but dragging the growth rate down due to massive red tape, conflicting regulations between the local and national levels and corruption.
Moreover, some short-sighted policies did nothing but sour the climate for investment further. For instance, Communication Minister Tifatul Sembiring’s threat to shut down Research In Motion’s operation in Indonesia and Churchill Mining’s troubles in East Kalimantan will spook foreign investors, wary that their investment will be politicized or simply taken away due to regulatory loopholes and corruption.
On the plus side, Dahlan Iskan’s appointment as the minister for state enterprises seems to be a great choice so far. Grade: B-.
Governance: Yudhoyono has a dysfunctional cabinet, with ministers unwilling to be the bearer of bad news to the president and unwilling to coordinate with each other. He succumbed to his political calculations and instead of streamlining the decision-making process, he created several positions of deputy ministers that further bloated the bureaucracy. Grade: D.
Corruption: Despite his campaign promises, corruption remains rampant within the bureaucracy and has had direct implications on people’s well-being and our national reputation, such as the collapsing bridges and graft surrounding the housing for athletes at the Southeast Asian Games.
Unchecked attempts to emasculate the to Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK), the Gayus show, Nazaruddin and Nunun’s adventures abroad (that only ended after public outcry), then Justice and Human Rights Minister Patrialis Akbar’s decision to reduce the sentences of graft convicts, and the failure of many regional courts to punish those who commit graft are just the very top of this wreck that did nothing but undermine the public’s trust in the seriousness of the government to clean house. Grade: F.
Human Rights and Religious Freedom: While the government always stresses its commitments in defending human rights and religious freedoms, events prove otherwise.
Religious extremists are still running around with implicit clearance from the law enforcement apparatus. The failure of the government to defend the Ahmadiyah, let alone to persecute their attackers, did nothing but to sully Indonesia’s name abroad. Worse, the Bogor mayor’s decision to close down the GKI Yasmin Church, citing dubious excuses and in spite of the Supreme Court’s decision to uphold the church’s position, made further mockery of the rule of law. Grade: D.
Military Reform: The military remains committed to transforming itself into a modern, professional organization.
Though the progress is slow, and misconduct remains rampant, the improvement has been steady. The government has also helped the reform with its commitment to slowly increasing the budget for arms procurement and in improving the military’s ties with the United States. Grade: A.
Law Enforcement: Corruption remains rampant within Indonesian law enforcement, extending from the police corps and the office of prosecutor to the judiciary system.
The Constitutional Court is the only relatively bright spot in an otherwise rotten system. While there are efforts to clean things up, most prosecutions are politically influenced or driven by popular outrage. Grade: D.
Foreign Policy: While there were many foreign policy accomplishments this year with Indonesia as the chair of Asean, the country also had its share of missteps. For instance, even though the Asean Summit was a huge international event, there was little coverage in Indonesia, with the government unable to rouse public enthusiasm for the event. In addition, various governmental missteps, such as its inability to protect its workers from unjustified capital punishment abroad put a blemish on the government’s record.
On the plus side, the government handled the border crisis decently, keeping the situation from spiraling out of control. Grade: C.
Final Evaluation: 2011 was a year of several missed opportunities, with Yudhoyono unable to develop a coherent long-term strategy for Indonesia. The promised reforms were nonexistent, due to the lack of decisiveness. One hopes that the government will show a little backbone next year, especially in tackling the issue of corruption. Overall Grade: C-.
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carolinetanjaya
1:42pm Dec 20, 2011
Although I cannot say I disagree with the rest of the evaluation, some of the examples mentioned under the corruption heading are not thoroughly accurate or balanced. Some of the collapsing bridges were procured and built before SBY assume the presidency,like the Kukar bridge and the new Justice and the Human Rights minister ordered for a stricter procedure to reduce the sentence of the graft convicts. Furthermore we have to appreciate the fact that Nazaruddin and Nunun were indeed caught and brought back to Indonesia for trial. However, I agree that there is still much room for improvement. Yohanes-Sulaiman
9:03pm Dec 20, 2011
@Carolinetanjaya: Thank you for your kind comments. While you are right that some of the collapsing bridges were built before his era, had he been through in cracking down on corruption, the local government would have been unable to skim the money used for the regular maintenance. We could even see a parade of the responsible parties on trial. Yet, a few weeks after the collapsed bridge, seems everything is back to the doldrums, that nobody got dragged kicking and screaming to the court to face the music.On the new Justice and Human Rights minister: I am grading him on his yearly performance, and like it or not, Patrialis could not do anything without his acquiesence, so Patrialis Akbar's blunders still stop at his desk.
On Naz and Nunun: Yeah, they got arrested after popular outrage and much embarassment. That's not a plus in my estimation.
DrDez
7:05am Dec 21, 2011
YohanesMore or less agree, I would have ranked a score lower on some issues re human rights & religious freedoms since he has been ineffective & has avoided the issues whenever religion has been a central theme.. Minor disagreement
However where I do disagree significantly is related to Military Reform. The bill (2008?) requiring the TNI to withdraw from SOE's has been all but ignored and in many ways that ties in with your corruption score - I would score MF no better than a C.
Caroline - Many of the maintenance contracts are controlled by a Kalla owned Group - they are paid extortionate amounts to and I quote 'check a few nuts and bolts'
Yohanes-Sulaiman
6:02pm Dec 21, 2011
@Dr. Dez: On religious freedom and human rights, I don't think he is THAT failed -- he had a bad score thanks to all these messes from GKI Yamin, Ahmadiyah, and now, that killings of the farmers in Lampung. Yet, we have to acknowledge that this is far from a police state, and he is guilty of being passive -- thus the grade D.On military reform: we can agree to disagree here. Yeah, the military is still in a mess, but from my dealing with them on a constant basis, it seems to me that the military itself is geniunely interested in reforming itself -- especially among the rank and file. True that they are still defending their vested interests and have a very narrow understanding of what their roles supposed to be and how to deal with e.g. Papua, but as a whole, the institution is truly moving forward, which is far cry to the rest of the nation.
Still, I may be biased here.
RuleBritannia
6:32pm Dec 21, 2011
@Yohanes: Concur re. your grades. However, in the words of Edmund Burke, "all that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing" so, the crime of passivity is perhaps one of the biggest crimes of all for a ruling president.Yohanes-Sulaiman
6:47pm Dec 21, 2011
@RuleBrittannia: I agree, but well, I could not say he was passive so this was a year of failure. Though I think Bung Hatta would have put it succinctly by quoting Schiller, his favourite poet: "The century has given birth to a time of greatness, But the great moment finds man small." RuleBritannia
7:11pm Dec 21, 2011
@Yohanes: Indeed . . And I'm sure those celebrating Christmas in a parking lot, together with many others, will be praying for John 4:23 'Cometh the hour, cometh the man.' as their New Year Wish!!DrDez
9:26pm Dec 21, 2011
The real crime is that SBY had a whole nation behind him - he had not only the elite but a popular vote to make real change... Almost no politician in history has had such a luxury - JFK, Churchill, Ghandi in the modern era perhaps - but the simple truth is he has blown it.. No debate, no more analysis, no more what if's... His next few years will be spent preparing the legacy (his protection)... It is abject failure if viewed from a national perspective as simple as thatnonredneck
10:13pm Dec 21, 2011
I 2nd caroline & Yohanes views.This comes back to political game of balances. To catch the fish,sometimes u hv to let the mud settle down OR sometimes u hv to disturb the water. To us it's easy when we see it on the news "hey u're not doing anything SBY!" but not so when we'r in tht position ourself having to deal with our own internal party, military, the imams, foreign preassure, economic etc. This reminds me of Sukarno's fragile balance of nasakom and cia. In order to attract a sizable amount of investment for further economic progress,a relative stability is required. A political strugle or worse if military & extremist-open-war is involved. These could even worsen the fragile situation. There's no quick attack solution for hundreds yr old problems,but regardless of heritage/culture/military/protests/religious,all balance will never be achieved if there is no economic prosperity. Indo can be monarcy like brunei for all I care but economic prosperity must be priotiry fr all policiesYohanes-Sulaiman
10:19pm Dec 21, 2011
Risking myself to be seen as starry-eyed idealist, I think we need a complete revamp of the election law. We should make it that a president can only reign for 1 term of 6 years. We will have the DPR election on the second and fourth years of the presidency -- providing feedback and rebukes to the ruling party. So, instead of having those clowns to sit pretty for 5 years in the parliament, they should be judged by population every two or four years.Otherwise, I'm afraid that the democracy can no longer be salvaged thanks to these clowns up there.
DrDez
5:16am Dec 22, 2011
YohanesMany (of us) have lobbied for voting reforms for years via working groups, business groups, advisory groups etc etc and what we witness time after time is that as soon as their power/prosperity is challenged the doors are firmly shut. You may recall my post about the spatial planning fiasco a few weeks ago - A typical example of exposing a deep flaw in the administration and then getting the door slammed.
NRN - I am sorry but economic prosperity at any costs is not a wise path. It is already twisted and used as the excuse for personal gain as it is and is incredibly narrow in its benefits. We are doing this/that for the nation translates to we are making a killing (literally sometimes) and don't care about the consequences
nonredneck
2:35pm Dec 22, 2011
DD: Just curious, in your business dealings, do you make money first and fix the system later, OR fix the system to perfection first then make money later? Assuming you are in the situation of the poor majority.DrDez
4:07pm Dec 22, 2011
NRNBorn from a philosophy to make things right first time, we employ the best people we can, pay very well & use a Toyota based system. We made no money for years & then about 35 years ago we took our first major export step Toshiba. A 1000% increase in turnover in 2 yrs resulted. 40 staff to 500. We still stuck by our philosophy & it stood up well.
20 years ago we had accredn with FAA & the biz exploded again. Current CEO is my oldest grandson who we have groomed since he was 15 & hopefully he will do the family proud.
I would say we plan well and always try get the model right; knowing that it will make money
Starting pay is 1.8x min wage + FF medical cover, free canteen and travel allowance. After 1 year we offer a lot of other stuff including profit share (2010 was Rp25jt/per person)
In return we have almost zero staff turnover and almost zero defects, we run at an ebita over 30% and pay our taxes. Our biggest issues are usually from the local mosques and village chiefs
blightyboy
4:59pm Dec 22, 2011
DrDez - I can only applaud. blightyboy
5:03pm Dec 22, 2011
nonredneck - The name you have chosen really is quite offensive.nonredneck
5:56pm Dec 22, 2011
blightyboy: I've explained my stance on my username before on different topic. If you're not an extremist, not a sawn-off-shotgun slinger, not a fighting-pitbull breeder, not a slave owner, and not a forest burner then you are also my friend... also a non-redneck.nonredneck
5:58pm Dec 22, 2011
DD: Your way sounds absolutely the way a business should be run, and I agree 100%. But in larger application, can this model be applied in larger scale of a nation? If it is applied though, won't this turn back to autocratic leadership style, and there will be no voting/protests to influence the direction of the company. Singapore is an example of how a state is run like a profitable enterprise, and the result is amazing! But this would also means lack of public involvement, and single party dominance over all policies. And SG policies as we know it tends to favor businesses, and economic prosperity. Only recently after the election, they change their style. So going back to economic first or system first, if for example Indo is to use your business philosophy then that would mean a strong dominant leader at the top to determine the direction of the ship, and among which social-strata can we find this kind of uncorrupted leader?DrDez
6:27pm Dec 22, 2011
NRN its a business model not a model nation. We do things by committee and only rarely does Mathew or previously myself make a singular decision. We run works councils, Health & Safety Councils, NPI Councils so that everyone has a say – They all own what they do and they are proud of the company and we are proud of them. We all wear the same gear, eat in the same canteen, start and finish at the same time, our wage structure is public – we operate a grades system. Nothing is underhand and if we have an issue we always deal with it publicly .If I had to run a nation – I would devise a different model – that model would start by splicing religion and state, it would also sell off all SOE’s and disband the military. It would open our doors to the world without prejudice… then see what we would become...At my age I have seen hope and despair in this nation - right now I have no confidence in our peoples ability to overturn the oppressor
padt
6:30pm Dec 22, 2011
And the issues from the local mosques and village chiefs are DrDez?BilboBaggins
8:08pm Dec 22, 2011
DrDez"right now I have no confidence in our peoples ability to overturn the oppressor "
It makes me sad that I feel that you are right on this point.
DrDez
8:15pm Dec 22, 2011
Padt : threats, stirring up trouble, asking for donations or bribes (not to cause trouble) & worse Example: years ago we built 2 schools & still pay for uniforms, books & our onsite Nurse visits to check on the kids
The local mosque man came saying he could get the stuff cheaper & it would give local people employment. The Nurse noticed the kids had not got new uniforms so she asked the teacher who said they had not had anything this term. My wife confronted the cleric. I had given him via bank transfer Rp15jt down payment as requested about 8 weeks previously. He said he had not had the cash, so I involved the bank who proved it had been paid. The Police refused to press charges unless we paid a fee. We lost Rp15jt – we bought more books and uniforms and then stopped the annual gift to the mosque (Rp25jt) Can you believe he came to ask for it the first year! We refused resulting in vandalism and threats to staff direct from him
Aceh1 Remind me again why I should like Islam?
DrDez
8:16pm Dec 22, 2011
BilboThe problem is that the majority would in their shoes do exactly the same
Valkyrie
9:21pm Dec 22, 2011
DrDez...I am able to understand how you feel about religion.
Just need to tell you that there are still some good apples in the basket.
SirAnthonyKnown-Bender
11:35pm Dec 22, 2011
Nice story from Dr Dez there and alas all too typical I fear. Rather than good apples, who would be good apples in any case, my own view is that religion, like the flag, is far more often something for bad apples to hide behind and mask their negativity behind a patina of respectability. And in related news I see that Iraq has lasted precisely one week after the Yanks left before reaching the verge of Islamic internecine civil war.DrDez
6:40am Dec 23, 2011
ValI have said this a million times. I have no issue with people being religious - UNTIL they start using their belief in god to hurt, kill, corrupt, oppress, control, outlaw blah blah(you get the picture)
Religion is a fine thing - it gives people hope and a support system.
What really pisses me off is when pious people have incredibly obvious double standards and use religion for personal gain.
What pisses me off even more is the ultra sensitivity that Islam is displaying right here right now
what pisses me off even more than that is the response of most religious people here 'well he cant be a Muslim the Koran forbids that' and on and on. ergo an Ostrich response
Sheesh when are we going to learn to live together? Why is Islam so frightened of criticism that the instant response is attack? When are the state going to stand up and protect the minority? Do recall that the minorities account for some 50 million people (approx 20% of 250m)its not like its a small number
DrDez
7:36am Dec 23, 2011
SirYes I agree - and re Iraq it looks like an all out sunni/shia conflict is on the cards - They will of course blame the CIA or Zionists... But the Sunni have been slaughtering Shia in Iraq this year via the bus load (literally)
2012 will be a bad year I can feel it in my water
Yohanes-Sulaiman
12:14pm Dec 23, 2011
@all: What we observe here is the unholy incest between religion and politics. As long are religion is used as means to achieve political goals without paying much attention to rule of law, expect such idiocy to continue unhindered. nonredneck
4:58pm Dec 23, 2011
DD: AHA...something clicks when you said "at my age"... Now I can see why we share many common agreement on issues, but the differece is in "hope". I'm guessing we as human measure our surroundings & future outlook based on our own lifespan. Say you live to 100 or more, it is most likely that you won't see much change at all,hence explain your outlook on the country. On the contrary I have a longer time to reach 100 so my outlook for the future is more hopeful therefore deemed more positive. But I'm surprised at so many younger audience reading JG having cynical views, I don't know if it's the sheep mentality, or they genuinely have cynical views at their young age, if they are genuine then I'll be worried because it's a vicious-cycle.nonredneck
4:58pm Dec 23, 2011
On iraq, it has officially become a stage for proxy wars, secular propaganda must be strengthen. I don't care how, but the PR machines must work hard to spin that secular propaganda in the hearts and minds. Nationalistic fascism is better than religious extremism, north korea is easier to dismantle than extremist hydrasDrDez
5:20pm Dec 23, 2011
NRN84 & married to my Indonesian wife (whom I met in Paris) over 50 years, we have lived in JK for nearly 44 years
I have seen a LOT of changes here, I see repeated & predictable patterns & right now we are in a cycle that will get significantly worse before it gets better. The TNI will figure large
Iraqi: the region will in 2012 see deaths beyond imagination. Civil war will continue in Syria & Yemen, sectarian violence will worsen in Iraq, Iran will maintain the support for Syria and The Shia in Iraq, Pakistan will continue killing itself until ISI takes over and no doubt will draw India into conflict. Behind the scenes Saudi will be pumping cash into Islamic extremism, the US will use the CIA as a counter measure, Russia and China will carry on their subversion. The MB will screw Egypt and probably in desperation take them to war with Israel, Turks meanwhile will continue to kill the kurds Marko would say its NWO time
I am not looking forward to '12. The grim reaper will be busy
nonredneck
4:36pm Dec 24, 2011
Hmmm many many dead bodies in mideast.... which is happier god or syaitan? > if their answer is 'g' then they're indicating that their 'g' is bloodthirsty. And if their answer is 's' then why use the 'g' name?
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