Jakarta – In July, when asked about democratic backsliding in Indonesia, President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo responded by saying that democracy is alive and well in the country, citing regular elections as proof.

The outgoing President also cited the fact that people could still criticize him on social media as more proof of the health of Indonesia's democracy.

The first assertion would make a convincing argument if the well-being of a democracy was judged solely on institutions and procedures.

But democracy does not rely on institutions and procedures alone.

Democracy can only progress if competition can take place between institutions, wherein checks and balances prevail in the political system.

President Jokowi, especially in the past five years of his administration, has made conscious, if not systematic efforts, to undermine those checks and balances.

One of the biggest gains of Reformasi was that the country's political system was arranged in a way that the executive, legislative and the judicial branches of the government could operate independently.

In the past five years, the executive branch has taken actions to make checks and balances difficult to exercise.

With enticement in the form of government positions, President Jokowi managed to cobble together a coalition of more than 80 percent of the seats in the House of Representatives, effectively killing off any possible dissent and opposition of his administration.

And with no opposition in the House, President Jokowi could ram through some controversial policy initiatives from the passing of the Omnibus Law and the construction of the new capital city in Kalimantan to the amendment of the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) law which put the anti-graft agency under the auspices of the president.

A formidable and proudly independent agency, the KPK has been effective in dealing with major graft cases at the heart of Indonesia's political system by arresting even some of the most senior politicians including a sitting House chairman who also served as leader of one of the country's biggest political parties.

Corruption has compromised the quality of Indonesian democracy and the KPK could contribute so much more to our democratic experiment if President Jokowi had not undermined its independence early in his second term.

Another victim in the effort to build a supremacy for the executive branch of the government is the Constitutional Court, one of the most respected Reformasi era institutions tasked with keeping legislative and executive overreach in check.

Late last year, political machinations forced the court to issue a ruling that was later used to justify the elevation of President Jokowi's son to the country's second highest political office.

The assault on the court has also brought about debate about the lack of ethics in politics, where politicians only stick to formal legal processes in search of power with little regard for decency and proprietary.

And as President Jokowi's second term winds down, there is almost no organization spared from his effort to impose control and discipline.

In August this year, Airlangga Hartarto was forced to resign from his position as Golkar chairman and was replaced by the President's right-hand man. Only a few weeks later, Arsyad Rasjid suffered the same fate, being forced to step down to make way for leadership backed by the outgoing President.

In the past few weeks, President Jokowi's public relations team has trumpeted his administration's successes, from stamping out extreme corruption to building more infrastructure to connect the country's far-flung regions.

We will not argue with that claim, but we must not lose sight of the significant negative changes that have occurred.

Democratic backsliding is an extremely high price to pay.

Source: https://www.thejakartapost.com/opinion/2024/10/16/the-price-of-democracy.htm