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AUGUST 18 , 2000 VOL. 26 NO. 32 | SEARCH ASIAWEEK Golkar Stirs the Party Pot Suharto's former lapdog weighs its options By WARREN CARAGATA Jakarta ALSO: • Wahid Stands His Ground: As a newly empowered assembly tests its arm If anything represents the uneasy muddle that is Indonesian politics these days, it may well be Golkar, the party of discredited ex-president Suharto. For three decades, Golkar was Suharto's loyal lapdog. So when Ginandjar Kartasasmita, a Suharto protégé, says Golkar "must cleanse ourselves from the habits of the old system," does he mean it? Can the leopard change its spots? By some measures, it already has. Three of Wahid's ministers are Golkar members and the party — the second-largest in parliament — played a key role in his election last year. Golkar's Marzuki Darusman, the attorney-general, has spearheaded the corruption investigation against Suharto and ordered the arrest of Bob Hasan, a Suharto business crony. But recently Golkar chairman Akbar Tanjung told a party congress that if the government could not turn things around, Golkar would consider withdrawing its ministers from the cabinet. This could have advantages both for the government and Golkar. Several observers have noted that Wahid has saddled himself with a coalition cabinet in which the parties are under no obligation to support him. "It is not clear who is the government party and who is the opposition party," says Jusuf Kalla, one of two ministers dumped from the cabinet in April. For Golkar, leaving the government would make it easier to address the process of reform and restructuring. Kalla and Ginandjar say this must happen if the party is to win another election. A spell in opposition, Kalla says, would also help young people elected last year to move up the party ranks. This "fresh young generation," he says, "is not contaminated by the old regime." Skeptics, of course, are not convinced. "It's quite deceptive to those who do not know the history," says Wimar Witoelar, a political commentator and leading member of the reform movement. Tanjung and Marzuki, he says, are just window dressing for a party that remains what it always was: a patronage machine. "They put on a good public relations front." Says legislator Mochtar Buchori: "Golkar is Golkar. It hasn't changed." Write to Asiaweek at mail@web.asiaweek.com
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