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With Jakartans’ Great Expectations to Manage, Jokowi and Ahok Start Off on the Right Feet
Yohanes Sulaiman | October 24, 2012
Last week, the new gubernatorial duo of Joko Widodo and Basuki Tjahaja Purnama were finally sworn in. After their success at the ballot box, they now must tackle one very important problem: managing the incredibly high expectations about their ability to solve Jakarta’s myriad problems.
With such high expectations about traffic, flooding and social ills, both voters and political opponents of the pair, better known as Jokowi and Ahok, are demanding quick, palpable results.
Voters are fickle and easily disappointed, especially when they think they voted for a miracle worker.
Political opponents, however, see the pair as a threat both to their personal ambitions and to their parties. Both Jokowi and Ahok’s success could be touted by their backers — the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) and the Great Indonesia Movement Party (Gerindra) — as proof that they are the only ones with competent administrators. This would obviously be a boon in the upcoming 2014 elections.
An inability to live up to the promises of the Jokowi-Ahok campaign would be seized upon by their political opponents to show that they were all talk and no action, and could even be used to ridicule both the PDI-P and Gerindra. Already Amien Rais, the co-founder of the National Mandate Party (PAN), has declared that Jokowi should be seen as a failure if he is unable to solve Jakarta’s traffic jams, social disorder and flooding within 100 days. In truth, nobody in their right mind would consider that even remotely possible.
The biggest task on hand at this point for Jokowi and Ahok is how to deal with these high expectations while at the same time buying enough time to deliver some real results before serious criticism — fair or not — starts to pile in.
So far, they have been pushing the right buttons. Jokowi has embarked on a kampung-hopping junket, visiting various areas of Jakarta and at the same time experiencing Jakarta’s famous, massive traffic jams. Jokowi’s willingness to actually experience the congestion offers a welcome contrast to elected leaders all over Indonesia who prefer motorcades, flanked by patrolmen whose sole duty is to clear the way for public officials unwilling to get stuck in the traffic.
Ahok, in the meantime, has been tackling Jakarta’s bureaucracy, launching surprise inspections and coming up with the idea of putting CCTVs in government offices in order to improve accountability.
While critics might argue that this is all show, smoke and mirrors, at least the pair have been using the public scrutiny effectively. They have managed to create the image that they are trying to understand the problems facing Jakarta and experiencing those problems firsthand.
More importantly, they are pushing for transparency. Unlike other politicians, they seem to actually welcome much scrutiny, hoping that the press will cover them at all times. By doing this, they are hoping to create an aura of accountability so the citizens of Jakarta will see them as trying to govern well.
Even though it will take a while before the massive problems facing Jakarta can be fixed, at least people see that their leaders are trying to do something, validating the trust of the voters that they tirelessly courted during the gubernatorial campaign.
In contrast to Jokowi, the Household Affairs Committee (BURT) is moving the other way with its new plans for the regulation of news coverage at the House of Representatives. Instead of increasing transparency, the BURT is trying to limit journalists’ ability to cover meetings. For instance, journalists would not be able to freely take photographs during meetings. Among other transparency-related concerns, this would minimize the possibility of journalists catching legislators watching pornography on their tablet computers, which happened to Arifinto from the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) last year.
Politicians should take notice: Transparency and accountability can be used as political capital. Many politicians in general avoid media scrutiny — by limiting transparency and accountability — because they believe that journalists will only cover their missteps and thus harm their political ambitions. However, if they would actually try to govern well, they would find that all this press scrutiny can also be used to prove that they are actually doing something worthwhile.
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TheSplodge
8:55am Oct 24,
2012
Yeah right. PAN has been around since 1998 and what has Rais or his party achieved in 14 years, let alone 100 days.
an2
9:52am Oct 24,
2012
Serigala-Berbulu-Domba
9:53am Oct 24,
2012
Asoegenie
10:50am Oct 25,
2012
menado
12:18pm Oct 25,
2012
Roland
12:38pm Oct 25,
2012
Everybody in its right mind understands that the traffic problem cannot be solved within 100 days - gestures can be made, priorities set but that's about it.
If Rais' party is part of the city council I would like to see on how they actually support Jokowi. That should have been priority and not calling people beforehand potential losers. Quite a disturbing person anyhow...Amien Rais I mean...
jchay
2:08pm Oct 25,
2012
Let us all Jakartans continue to support Jokowi-Ahok's management way of BTP (Bersih Transparan Professional).
Valkyrie
4:38pm Oct 25,
2012
You are a total disappointment!
Arkmahinda
6:14pm Oct 25,
2012
"Politicians should take notice: Transparency and accountability can be used as political capital. Many politicians in general avoid media scrutiny — by limiting transparency and accountability — because they believe that journalists will only cover their missteps and thus harm their political ambitions."
This suggests that state officials are not willing to govern this nation in an orderly manner.
Their fear of media coverage shows that they are honestly saying "we are up to no good, look away,"
Another loss to the House. Please your majesty honorable representatives of the people, show us that you are worth it.
NavoShant
6:24pm Oct 25,
2012
Amien Rais' comment: a loser's INSECURITY n ARROGANCE. At least Jokowi Ahok has been trying, they plan n takes one step at a time, unlike some failed ex-president corrupting from the whole country.
not even an ex-president, but president wanna-be
maspanji
9:14am Oct 26,
2012
Amien Rais should go back to sleep ( that is what he is been doing all the time and always misses the train ).
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