Megawati Wijaya, Jakarta – When President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono became Indonesia's first directly elected democratic leader in 2004, the former soldier was catapulted to power despite the fact his Democratic Party had won a mere 7.5% of the vote in previous legislative elections.
Now with new legislative and presidential elections scheduled for this year, political analysts are focusing on the potentially pivotal role of the so-called golput, registered voters who choose for various reasons to either stay away from the polls or cast blank ballots, which accounted for around 25% of the electorate at the 2004 legislative polls.
With relatively peaceful and orderly elections in both 1999 and 2004, Indonesia's decade-old transition from authoritarian to democratic rule has been widely lauded as a regional success story. Former strongman Suharto, who throughout his 32-year tenure was officially returned to power in six different elections, tightly controlled the country's electoral process, which he famously referred to as "festivals of democracy".
At that time only three political parties were allowed to participate in the polls, which were consistently won by the military-linked Golkar party; in the first elections of the post-Suharto era, 145 parties registered and 48 parties finally took part in the 1999 polls. In 2004, the legislative polls were contested by 24 political parties in a sprawling democratic process that spanned 14,000 islands, three time zones, and entailed more than 500,000 polling stations.
Less critical attention, however, has been paid to the role of the golput, the huge number of registered voters who choose to not take part in the 2004 legislative polls after nearly 95% of the electorate took part in the 1999 elections. Accounting for over 25% of eligible voters, the golput was the real percentage winner of the 2004 elections, outpacing the top vote-getting Golkar party, which received just 21.6% of the popular vote.
The term "golput", an antithetical spin on the word Golkar, harks to the Suharto-era when voters rebelled against the oppressive, military-backed New Order regime by casting empty ballots or purposefully spoiling their votes. Then the golput figure was smaller, estimated on average at around 10%, as Indonesians feared the consequences of their acts of defiance.
In the democratic era, the golput is much larger and defined loosely as anyone who fails to vote during the election. The reasons for non-participation vary: some can't be bothered to vote; some are overwhelmed by the electoral choices; and, perhaps most crucially, many feel the democratic process has – like its authoritarian forerunner – failed to adequately address the crucial issues of inequality, injustice and corruption that successive elected leaders have promised to tackle.
Analysts say it also demonstrates a rising political maturity among voters who are not willing to simply settle and choose among parties and candidates they feel are out of touch with average voters' needs and aspirations. While more democracy has brought positive changes, including a freer press and greater scrutiny of public affairs, elected leaders have failed to tackle the many systemic and economic problems that directly impact on voters' livelihoods.
Silent protests
With new legislative elections scheduled for this April 9, the golput phenomenon is expected to make its popular absence felt again. Judging by the dismal turnout at recent regional elections, research company Indo Barometer, among others, predict that the golput figure could reach as high as 40%.
For instance, the golput rate at the 2008 Cilacap in Central Java province and neighboring Banyumas regency elections stood respectively at 43% and 45%. Meanwhile, the golput rate at the Central Java gubernatorial election also held last year was estimated at nearly 70%.
Those embarrassingly high rates of non-participation are raising hackles among politicians. Cilacap Regent Probo Yulastoro reportedly promised 23 district chiefs in his regency that each village administration would receive a free motorcycle if they could keep the golput rate at or lower than 5% in their villages during the election.
The Indonesian Ulama Council (MUI), an umbrella organization of major Islamic groups, even issued a fatwa stating that it is "a moral sin" if one does not cast his vote in this year's elections. The MUI is known to support certain Islamic political parties which in past polls have performed poorly.
In a public opinion survey of over 5,000 workers from both the government and private sectors spanning 33 Indonesian provinces, only 17.8% respondents said that they would choose not to vote. But the actual golput tally at upcoming elections could be much higher as 76.2% of the respondents in the same poll said that they "are not interested" in following the campaigns of both political parties and presidential candidates.
Analysts and academics have different interpretations of the high non-vote rates. According to Max Lane, a writer, researcher, and political analysts with over 38 years experience in the country, Indonesians are not politically apathetic. "Everyone, everywhere, in Indonesia is talking and enjoys talking about politics," he said.
"If Indonesians don't feel that any of the parties are championing their causes, they have the legal right not to choose," said Evi Arifin, a researcher at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore. By not choosing, she said, the golput has made a clear statement by not supporting any of the proposed parties and candidates.
An increasingly free media has highlighted that national sentiment. The satirical political talk show, Demo Crazy, shown on national television recently referred to the people running for upcoming elections as itu-itu saja lagi or "the same old faces running again". Indeed the 2009 presidential poll seems likely to be a rerun of the previous one, with former president Megawati Sukarnoputri and incumbent Yudhoyono widely expected to square off again.
This is despite the fact that neither candidate while in office was able to make a serious dent in endemic economic problems, including persistently high poverty and unemployment rates that are expected to only get worse as the global and financial economic crisis impacts on the country's crucial manufacturing and export sectors.
Meanwhile, organized groups of laborers and farmers are still not adequately represented in government. That, analysts say, explains the high frequency of street demonstrations mounted against Yudhoyono's government. "[General elections] are only for powerful people or people who used to be in power to choose who is going to be in power next. This [election] is just a form of fraud," said Emelia Yanti, the secretary general of United Federation of Independent Labor.
After 10 years of democracy, many Indonesians feel that government has failed to bring through new policies for real improvements to their livelihoods. While there are fundamental differences between the Suharto-era golput and its new democratic incarnation, the symptoms of voter frustration with Indonesia's political system are glaringly similar.
In 2004, none of the major political parties garnered enough votes to reach the 25% threshold legally required to nominate their own presidential candidate. That led to complicated coalition building, which effectively catapulted the military-linked Golkar back to the fore in a power-sharing arrangement with Yudhoyono's Democratic Party.
That less-than-ringing electoral mandate has made it difficult for Yudhoyono to pass badly needed economic and other reforms through the legislature. Whether Indonesia can afford another weak administration in the wake of growing global turmoil is an increasingly important electoral question. But if recent elections and opinion polls are any indication, the golput will likely de facto win another Indonesian poll.
[Megawati Wijaya is a Singapore-based journalist. She may be contacted at megawati.wijaya@gmail.com.]