Depends on the Opposition

By  Akhmad Zamroni Sw.

Source: https://bit.ly-2YQZhn

Approximately one year ago, many community members and observers were worried when they learned that Joko Widodo’s camp was embracing Prabowo Subianto’s camp to form a coalition in running the new government for the 2019-2024 period.

When the coalition finally took place and was formed some time before October 2019, the concerns of the public and observers then turned into apathy and pessimism about the competence of the new government in carrying out democracy in Indonesia.

The massive coalition that brings together the two biggest powers (PDIP and Gerindra) in the Indonesian political constellation will clearly reduce and disarm the opposition so that the application of democracy is very difficult to run properly in the administration of the life of the nation and state.

Jokowi and PDIP should indeed take control of the government because they won the 2019 Election contestation, while as the losers and in parliament only occupying the second position, Prabowo and Gerindra should fill the opposition camp.

If Prabowo-Gerindra is in the opposition camp, there will be balanced checks and balances between the ruling and opposition factions in the parliament (DPR) and between parliament and the government in our state administration because Prabowo-Gerindra has a large number of personnel (seats) and is competitive with Jokowi-PDIP.

However, Prabowo-Gerindra has already partnered with Jokowi-PDIP so that the dynamics in the parliament and the control of the DPR on the government are clearly not moving or going through a process of adequate checks and balances because the opposition only remains to be held by small forces (PKS and Demokrat) which are quantitatively far behind under the power of the Prabowo-Gerindra and Jokowi-PDIP coalitions.

Thus, the consequences are very clear: government policies and even the DPR's own decisions are not designed and determined through adequate democratic mechanisms, namely proper supervision, control and criticism, so that both government and DPR policies are not aspirational and tend to be only accommodate the interests of a group of people and society.

The ratification of the revision of the KPK (Komisi Pemberantasan Korupsi --- Corruption Eradication Commission) law and the election of members of the KPK leadership which strongly indicated the “weakening of this anti-corruption institution” and the ratification of the omnimbus law on work copyright which was very pro-entrepreneurial were the most concrete examples of the malfunctioning of the democratic system (checks and balances) properly in decision-making in the DPR and the government of our country due to the small and weak opposition.

Until 2024, it is almost certain that similar things will continue to happen: government and DPR policies will be drafted, discussed, decided, and enacted (passed) with little consideration or even completely ignoring democratic principles.

So far, the implementation of democracy still depends on the opposition: less or no opposition, democracy can be neglected or even dead; there is adequate opposition, democracy can be expected to pulsate and come to life.