Goenawan Mohamad is one of Indonesia’s most famous public figures, a journalist and writer with impeccable credentials. As an essayist, his commentaries on Indonesian politics, society, and culture have long been a source of inspiration, especially for progressives, liberals, and modernists.* He founded Tempo, the most important periodical in Indonesia. Coming of age as a writer during the New Order regime, he was a frequent target of government criticism, and Tempo was shuttered a couple of times.
Now in his early 80s, Mas Gun is still active. He still has the low-key, everyman style that I remember, and when he speaks, one listens. He is not prone to exaggeration or excess. And he had some very harsh words to say about President Joko Widodo and the state of Indonesian democracy right now, which you can watch in this TikTok clip of an interview with Rosi on KompasTV. It is, unfortunately, in Indonesian, but I will highlight the important bits.
It is powerful. When it begins, Goenawan is in the middle of a criticism of the sitting president’s second son, Kaesang Pangarep, who is now the head of the Indonesian Solidarity Party. This party, which is known as a youth-focused party, is relatively pluralistic and progressive. The decision to install political newcomer and banana-stand owner Kaesang as its chair is pretty ridiculous, and betrays not only the hollowness of the party organization but also the deep machinations of Indonesia’s first family in the runup to the 2024 elections.
But things turn even more serious when Goenawan brings up the Constitutional Court. The background: Jokowi’s first son, Gibran Rakabuming Raka, is the vice presidential candidate on the ticket of Prabowo Subianto. Long-time readers will remember when I attended a Prabowo rally a decade ago. Well, Prabowo is still at it. And due to the complex swirl of dynastic alliance politics that I can’t even begin describe (but Yoes Kenawas can!) Prabowo and Jokowi are now in an alliance of convenience to make Jokowi’s twice-defeated opponent the president in order to secure Joko Widodo’s legacy.**
This wouldn’t be so bad if it were not for the fact that the Indonesian Constitution forbids Gibran from standing for VP because he is too young. And for the fact that Indonesia’s Constitutional Court simply ignored this rule in order to allow Gibran to run. Jokowi’s sister is married to the Constitutional Court’s chief justice. The implications are obvious.
With tears in his eyes, Goenawan describes his country as rusak [= broken] due to the Constitutional Court’s decision. He talks about his children and grandchildren experiencing kekacauan [= fracturing, chaos]. And then he talks about his own father, shot to death by the Dutch in the fight for independence. All of this is to imply that the fight for democracy and independence was worth much more than whatever is happening right now. He closes by implying that he won’t be here in 10 years. Rosi says, “oh that’s not certain,” thinking that Goenawan means that he’ll be dead by then. Goenawan replies with a twinkle in his eye, “I’ll be in America.”
These are hard times for Indonesian democracy. I’ve never seen public figures so directly and publicly express such fundamental concerns about the basic state of Indonesian politics. And Goenawan is not the only one. Hashtag democratic backsliding.
NOTES
* He is a founding voice in the Utan Kayu/Salihara/JIL group that I intersected with in the mid-2000s, which I discussed just a couple weeks ago. I only had the chance to meet him once, though.
** Or whatever. I frankly don’t understand what is going on and I refuse to believe the simplistic surface-level explanation that Jokowi just cares about his legacy and is indifferent to the implications for Indonesian democracy. One hears rumors about various interests, small scale corruption schemes that risk exposure, big conspiracies, Javanese cultural tendencies. But I have learned not to listen to such vague discussions of pihak-pihak tertentu.
Tom Pepinsky 