Open Letter to Mr. SBY

Andi Malarangeng – the presidential spokesperson - wrote in this week’s Tempo about the merit of direct voting for parliament members. The President is campaigning to change the law so that in the next election we will be voting for individuals directly as opposed to a party-assigned rank of priority.

The campaign starts early. It’s embarrassing that the President even has the time for this stuff. This is the world’s third largest democracy, the first directly elected President after 60 years of independence (include 40 odd years of ruthless tyrants and abundance of chaos to fill in the gaps). For the very first time in its history, this country – all 280m people of it – has the chance to choose their own leader. For the first time in its history, too, these people can say whatever they want, almost wherever they want. The first time in almost ten years, that the unruly mob keeps to their senses and participated in the politics of it.

For the first time, the President wields some political capital and credibility to spare and convince that he was there to lead.
And he spends his time to woo the National Female Caucus for female votes. Direct votes for individuals will get him more votes from the female candidates (female nominees tend to be assigned to lower priority by the parties) and likely to help his party by the occasional celebrity-cum-politician allies. The Party holds too few seats in the Parliament and he’s forever humbled by the seemingly all powerful Vice Presidents. With all due respect Mr. President, he stands barely to your shoulder.


Dear Mr. President,

You’ve a cabinet member, a Social Welfare Minister (also one of Forbes richest men) who is currently displacing some 20,000 people in the largest man-made national disaster ever. Social Welfare. Is that an inside joke?
Your shorter Vice President is ordering tax free choppers for fun.
You’ve a judicial reform that couldn’t manage to pick 12 honest judges for Supreme Court.
You’ve a Justice murdering tycoon granted with the largest sentence reduction in the judicial history of the country. And you gave him $1.5bn right out prison.
You’ve a human rights activist killed in a national carrier eating airplane food. Qantas wasn’t that bad.
You’ve entire forests burn in flames, world’s largest ecological disaster happening in your very own backyard. Do you even smell that?
You’ve a food crisis in the world’s fifth largest nation. You’ve the poorest farmer in all farming nations. Do you know that?
You’ve coalition partners shagging B-list celebs on regular basis and this is the good news.

Sure enough, inflations are in single digits and we’ve new huge malls and fewer people are murdering each other and I actually have a regular income, but to float the boat is hardly a promise that we will ever get anywhere at all.

Dear Mr. President,

You’ve 280m people that already voted for you and election is still quite a while away.
You’ve an illiterate ex-president grandma and blind men for your nearest competition.
You’ve a country full of people that wait.
You’ve a Presidential spokesperson with the ugliest grin and cheap tie to do your cheap campaign for the cheap votes.
You’ve a country full of people that are very tired of waiting.

Dear Mr. President,

You were elected by the people, in the largest direct democratic election in the history of all democracies.
You promised them a future.
In return, they get the rude assurance not to ever fall backward.
That was the best that they could ever hope for.
Democracy at its best, institutionalised mass delusion.
The very best trick the devil ever pulled.
I’ll be damned if I were to give you my vote.
Ever.

Please, at the very least, do tell Mr. Malarangeng to stop grinning and get a better tie.