WEEKLY SUMMARY SPECIAL REPORT INDONESIA: THE ARMY'S FIRST ELECTIONS

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Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927A008900010002-4 Special Report Indonesia: The Army s First Elections DIRECTORATE OF INTELLIGENCE Secret WEEKLY SUMMARY Secret N2 16 25 June 1971 No. 0376/71A Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927AO08900010002-4 Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927AO08900010002-4 Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927AO08900010002-4 SECRET INDONESIA: THE ARMY'S FIRST ELECTIONS On 3 July Indonesia will hold its first national elections since 1955. At stake are over three fourths of the seats of the 460-member Parliament, which.has nominal legislative authority. Those elected to Parliament will also sit in the 920-member congress; this body formulates national policy and in 1973 will choose the next president and vice president. The government's immediate aims, therefore, are to ensure both a responsive parliament and a congress that two years from now will re-elect President Suharto for another five-year term. The army-dominated government agreed only reluctantly to hold elections and is working through its unofficial political party, SEKBER GOLKAR, to ensure a strong government return. The government, viewing economic improvement as the nation's primary task, has insisted that neither the conduct of the elections nor their outcome should divert the country from the major reconstruction effort made necessary by the economically exhausting Sukarno era. It is equally emphatic that there be no return to the extreme nationalism and pro-Communism that characterized the final years of the Sukarno period. Candidates have been carefully screened, and members of the banned Communist Party and its affiliated organizations are denied the vote. The campaign has been conducted under fairly stringent government restrictions and under close observation. Besides the government-sponsored SEKBER GOLKAR, the chief contestants in the election are the secular National Party and two Moslem parties. They have been waging a moderately active campaign, but one well within the constraints imposed by the government. The parties are under no illusion about their chances of winning a clear-cut victory, but they view participation in the election as necessary to maintaining their status as political entities. In holding the elections, the government sees itself as satisfying the demands of the political parties; by winning the elections-and it has every intention of polling at least a plurality-Djakarta apparently feels it will have put the final stamp of legitimacy on the "new order," i.e., the army-dominated political forces that between 1965 and 1967 ousted and supplanted the Sukarno regime. The government also has an idea, still only vaguely formulated, that the development of its party, SEKBER GOLKAR, will be a step toward restructuring the political party system. 1 PARTAI KATOLIK 2 PARTAI SIARU(AT ISLAM INDONESIA 3 PARTAI NAHDLATUL ?ULAMA + T1 *. 4 PARTAI MUSLDMIN INDONESIA 5 OOLONOAN KARMA . YJl 6 PARTAI KRISTEN INDONESIA IPARKINDO) 7 M U R B A MURBA 8 P. N. L PNL-MASSAMARHAEN 9 PARTAI ISLAM PERTI PERTI 10 PARTAI IP-KI Party Symbols SECRET Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927AO08900010002-4 SECRET The major aspects of Indonesia's sociopoliti- cal life today are a highly centralized government and the dominant position of the military, which distrusts political parties and is convinced that it should continue in a political role for another eight to ten years. Underlying these is the basic fact of Indonesia's ethnic, regional, and religious diversity, which has created cleavages in the na- tion's society and is reflected in the political party system. Since mid-1966 when it began to consolidate its take-over from President Sukarno, the Suharto administration has given the country the most effective and progressive government it has had in its 22 years of independence. The army, alone among Indonesian organizations, is nationally focused and, by the nature of its long-held secu- rity and political role, is a force for national unity rather than divisiveness. President Suharto and his colleagues believe the army must continue the political mission of guiding and shaping the Indonesian state during these still formative years. They have been willing Special Report to give the political parties some voice in govern- mental affairs, but they have made sure that the parties do not endanger the general policy lines that have been established. They believe that a return to civilian government in the near future would be tantamount to a return to the insta- bility that characterized the seven and a half years of parliamentary government during the 1950s. The Suharto administration maintains, however, that one of its major goals is the eventual develop- ment of a government that is both representative and politically stable. It speaks of the restruc- turing of the political party system as a step in this process. For the time being and for the foreseeable future, the army plans to operate under its "dual function" doctrine, which maintains that the mili- tary is not only a defense and security organiza.. tion but also a full participant in the political, economic, and social life of the nation. In conducting the business of government, Suharto and the army have continued what now seems to be an established Indonesian political tradition, i.e., a strong reliance on improvisation. This improvisation is, however, partially deter- mined by a general structure of legality and a respect for legal forms. The present basis of gov- ernment is the "1945 constitution," a hastily written and provisional document prepared im- mediately prior to Indonesia's declaration of independence to support an emergency govern- ment. It was set aside in 1950 but reinvoked on Sukarno's orders in 1959 to justify his imposition of "guided democracy" and his assumption of virtually unchallenged power. The constitution provides for a strong execu- tive empowered with both legislative and judicial functions and imposes few formal restraints on executive powers. It calls for a president, a presi- dential cabinet, a parliament that shares legislative and veto power with the president, and a congress that sets the "guidelines of national policy" and elects the president and vice president for five- year terms. The Suharto regime has sought to 2- 25 June 197 1 SECRET Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927A008900010002-4 SECRET restore to these institutions their constitutional functions. It has carefully retained and employed, however, the sweeping executive authority pro- vided by the 1945 document. The lack of a clear blueprint of government in the constitution per- mits considerable flexibility and could assist the nation in its search for an appropriate political system. Geographically, Indonesian political life is centered in Java, where 65 percent of the nation's 120 million people are located. Other population centers are the island of Sumatra (16 percent), Sulawesi (7 percent) and Kalimantan (4 percent). The electorate is estimated at 57 million, or ap- proximately 48 percent of the population. The government's decision to hold elections fulfills a promise made in 1966 during the long period of maneuver between the so-called new order and President Sukarno. During that time a major rallying cry used by Suharto and his col- leagues was the "return to a rule of law." When the Indonesian Congress, the nation's highest policy-making body, convened in mid-1966 to begin the task of realigning foreign and domestic policy, one of its first accomplishments was the passage of a resolution calling for national elec- tions within two years. Army and political party representatives in the provisional parliament, however, were unable to reach agreement on an election law within that time, and elections were postponed until July 1971. The government, however, remained appre- hensive lest elections promote religious and re- gional disunity, deflect national energies from the government's priority economic improvement program, and provide a forum for criticism of the army. Therefore, in 1969 it put out feelers to the parties for another election postponement. With only one exception, the nine parties insisted that elections be held as scheduled. President Suharto, who is more moderate than many of the other military leaders, apparently felt the more prudent course would be to uphold the 1966 congres- sional resolution; he therefore agreed that plans for elections should go forward. Once the deci- sion had been made, the government pressed forward with diligence. The election laws were passed in November 1969, and the necessary administrative procedures were implemented on schedule. The election laws provide for the election of all but 100 members of the 460-member Parlia- ment and of the preponderance of each of the 26 provincial legislatures. Although there will be no direct election of the 920-seat congress (which formulates national policy and elects the presi- dent and vice president), this body nevertheless will be indirectly affected because Parliament makes up half of its membership. The government has a considerable initial advantage over the political parties in that it will appoint the 100 members of Parliament who are not elected directly and one fifth of the member- ship of the provincial legislatures. These ap- pointees will come from the military and from nonpolitical civilian groups-chosen in the ratio of three military members to one civilian. Despite the disparity in population between Java (65 per- cent) and the outer islands (35 percent), elected parliamentary seats are so allocated as to make the two areas nearly equal in representation. This is an effort to appease the non-Javanese, who have traditionally complained that the govern- ment is too Java oriented. Indonesia's political parties had their be- ginnings in the prerevolutionary, anti-Dutch na- tionalist movement, and some of their leaders see themselves as having played a formative role in nation building. Most of today's parties began as pressure groups for self-government or inde- pendence. Over time, each party gradually gathered the support of such groups as youth, Special Report -3- SECRET Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927AO08900010002-4 SECRET labor, women, and farmers with whom it held ethnic, religious, or other interests in common. Theoretically, the parties and their associated groups stand for a political point of view, but in reality they represent ethnic or religious interests. For the most part, the parties are incapable of defining demands beyond asking, in effect, for favored treatment. As the parties see it, their finest hour was the 1949-57 era of parliamentary government that in seven and one half years was marked by seven coalition cabinets. This period of political instability ended when Sukarno imposed the con- cept of "guided democracy," a system that became steadily more authoritarian and con- siderably reduced the role of the parties. In the 1965-67 period, the parties supported the army, in part because of genuine anti-Communism, but also because they were eager to reassert them- selves politically. For a brief time, at least, they viewed the army as an instrument for returning them to national power. It did not work out that way. The govern- ment retained the 1945 constitution under which the legislature is relegated to a subordinate posi- tion. The Suharto regime furthermore has clearly exhibited a preference for technicians rather than politicians. The parties still exert some leverage, however, and Suharto takes civilian political views into consideration to the extent he deems advisa- ble in determining policy. The government pub- licly rationalizes that a de-emphasis of party politics is necessary until further progress has been made toward economic recovery, and that economic stabilization, in turn, is a prerequisite for political stability. Seven representatives of political parties hold eight of the 23 cabinet portfolios, but four of these posts are largely sinecures that were deliberately established to give the appearance of party participation. At least two of the other posts are held by men who serve because of their technical know-how rather than because they are party members. The portfolios of religion and Special Report social welfare, held by representatives of the Moslem Nahdatul Ulama (NU), are partial excep- tions. Even here, however, the government has curtailed the patronage and other levers of power through which the NU might normally be ex- pected to exercise its influence. Political organizations make substantial use of the press to express their views, and every major organization or bloc has its own daily. The non-Communist press enjoys relative freedom largely on the sufferance of Suharto and a few of the more moderate high-ranking officers. Govern- ment moves in preparation for the election, how- ever, have been keenly felt within this sector during the past year. The major division within organized politics in Indonesia today is between those who express themselves politically through religious groups or parties and those whose allegiance is to secular organizations. Although 85 percent of Indonesia's 120 million people are classified as Moslem, Islam infiltrated the country over the centuries (from the 13th Century on) in varying degrees of in- tensity. For this reason, and not because of any recent secularization, only some 40 to 45 percent of the population are political Moslems in the sense that they identify with and loyally support Moslem organizations. These Moslems or "san- tris" are themselves split between modernists, who are represented by the Indonesian Moslem Party, and traditionalists, who are represented by the Nahdatul Ulama. The nonsantri Moslems or secularists may be religiously devout or nonreligious or tied to pre- Islamic religious observances, but all are opposed to Moslem-inspired organizations. Many secular- ists greatly fear Moslem political domination. In addition to their disdain for what they perceive to be santri self-righteousness and puritanism, they believe politically victorious Moslems would at- tempt to rid Indonesian culture of non-Islamic elements that the nonsantris hold precious. The army too harbors a special distrust for the Moslem parties, an attitude based partly on - 4 - 25 June 1971 SECRET Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927AO08900010002-4 Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927A008900010002-4 SECRET the involvement of various Moslem elements in armed dissidence during the 1950s and partly stemming from the assumption-similar to that held by the nonsantris-that any faithful Moslem whether moderate, traditional, or extreme wants to replace Indonesia's official secularism with a Moslem state. The secularists, like the santris, can be said to be divided between traditionalists and modern- ists with the former gravitating to the Indonesian National Party. The modernists have tended in the past to join the small, elitist Socialist Party if they were well-educated; if not, they moved into the ranks of the large and expanding Communist Party or its many affiliated groups. Both of these organizations are now banned. The Socialists were proscribed by Sukarno in 1960, the Communist Party by the Suharto government in 1966. Today their former followers have no recognized organi- zation of their own. The Indonesian political . party can be likened to a pyramid with most political action at the apex. Only when the party leadership wishes to develop some leverage in Djakarta does it prod its broad base of followers out of their inertness into some form of political activity. Under normal circumstances the Indonesian population is passive and accepts and adapts to firm author- ity, such as that demonstrated by the Suharto government, but there have been instances when the public has proved highly susceptible to agitation. There is little mutual trust among Indo- nesian political parties, a major factor contrib- uting to past instability. The parties tend to be ingrown and to harbor basic doubts and dislike for other regions and ethnic groups which, al- though overlaid by nationalism, can be surfaced fairly readily. The narrow particularism of the parties has contributed heavily to the govern- ment's concern that the elections could excite and reinforce at the grass-roots level some of the very divisions that the administration hopes ul- timately to de-emphasize. Special Report The Three Large Parties Indonesia's three major political parties are the secular National Party, the orthodox Moslem Nahdatul Ulama, and the modernist Indonesian Moslem Party. Although none of them expects to win a plurality in the July election, at least two have hopes of getting a significant vote. The National Party (PNI), which in the pre- 1965 era identified with Sukarno and cooperated with the Communists, has-at army insistence- considerably purged itself. The purge, however, was far from complete, and the PNI is unlikely ever to assume a complexion entirely suitable to the army. It still tends to be pro-Sukarno, and because its greatest strength is in densely popu- lated Central and East Java-areas that were formerly the major bastions of Sukarno and the Communists-it finds Sukarnoism (i.e., the em- ployment of the late president's name and a tendency toward xenophobia and extreme na- tionalism) a tempting campaign tactic. The moderate wing of the PNI has supported the Suharto government although it wishes to be rela- tively independent of the army and to pursue its own role as a political party. Elements of the left and larger wing are suspected of still knowingly permitting Communist infiltration. The party as a whole, however, serves army purposes as a secular counter to the Moslem parties. Much of the leadership of the PNI comes from the old aristocracy which, under the Dutch and even more after independence, moved into the bureaucracy. The party's mass support has come largely from the nonsantri, ethnic Javanese peasants who continue to follow the political direction of their "betters"-the village headmen, government officials, and schoolteachers. The army toyed briefly with the idea of developing the PNI as a political:ally. To this end, it put pressure on the party to elect a chairman last year who, despite his leftist support, seemed amenable to army direction. This stratagem divided the PNI leadership, sowed confusion in SECRET Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927AO08900010002-4 SECRET Special Report SECRET R11 L IT ON S (,-R-F A T F P Bandjarmasiri SUINUH ISLANDS JAVA SEA JAKARTA ? r ~/ 1 _J filar I) 'M A O U R A BBa dung ? A u 4 t qi / Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927AO08900010002-4 For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927AO08900010002-4 Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927AO08900010002-4 SECRET 4AKASSAK STRAIT ?&'Arnbon C~ BANDA SEA INDIAN OCEAN South Chin Sea KFP LAUAN A u ORTUGUESE TIMOR ARAFURA SEA ER -Kupang A TERR. OF PAPUA "tQust.) Special Report - 7- SECRET Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927A008900010002-4 SECRET the ranks, and temporarily halted the party's ef- forts to organize its election campaign. These developments pleased the army more than its initial idea of a political alliance. Despite its dif- ficulties with the army, the PNI, which is the largest party in the present provisional parlia- ment, should still do reasonably well in the elec- tions in Central and East Java and parts of Sumatra. The Nahdatul Ulama-Moslem Scholars Party (NU)-the larger of the two major Moslem parties and the second largest party in parliament, is traditionalist, rural, opportunistic, and long at odds with its fellow religious party. In prein- dependence years, the NU's leaders, who came from commercial life in East Java, were Moslem traditionalists who regarded the Moslem reform movement with considerable misgivings. They continue to derive their sociopolitical ideas from a group of traditionalist educational institutions. During the Sukarno era, the Java-centered NU did not become involved in the provincial rebellion of the late 50s, and its pliable leaders publicly en- dorsed Sukarno's "guided democracy" and his philosophy of "Nasokom"-a blending of Com- munism, nationalism, and religion. In contrast with the harmony between the NU and Sukarno in Djakarta, however, friction developed in the 1960s at the local level between the NU's fervently Moslem followers and ad- herents of the PNI and the Communist Party. After the abortive Communist coup of October 1965, it was the NU's militant youth group, Ansor, that took a leading role in the extensive killings of Communists in East Java. The NU had little difficulty in making the switch from Sukarno to Suharto, and as a reward it received a hitherto unprecedented political pre- eminence in East Java. More recent government efforts, first on behalf of the PNI and later in support of the government party, SEKBER GOLKAR, have reduced the NU's influence to something approximating former levels. The army's intention evidently was to cut the NU's Special Report provincial representation to a level more in line with Moslem grass-roots strength. The NU is still interested in the idea of making Indonesia a theocratic state, but it has not pressed this point hard in recent years. Aside from its principal following in the villages of East Java, it has further support in West Java and parts of Sumatra and Kalimantan. Despite the effects of proselyting by SEKBER GOLKAR, the NU should still do fairly well in both Java and the outlying areas. The modernist Indonesian Moslem Party (PMI) is the political heir of the once large Masjumi, a Moslem party banned by Sukarno in 1960. The core of the Masjumi was a group of men who were at one and the same time Western- educated, devout Moslems, and ardent national- ists. Although they regard themselves as strugglers against Sukarno who should be refurbished and restored to national prominence, the government has remained totally unsympathetic. The govern- ment agreed in 1968 to the formation of the PM I to replace the Masjumi, but it has repeatedly obstructed the new party's development. Like Sukarno, the army has never forgiven the partici- pation of some Masjumi leaders in the 1958 pro- vincial rebellion, and it seems unable or unwilling to distinguish between the Masjumi's moderate leaders and Masjumi fringe elements who assisted the fanatical Darul Islam movement in its 13-year military effort to establish a Moslem state. Fur- ther, the army may be apprehensive about the organizational talents of former Masjumi leaders who, aside from the Communists, probably have excelled over other Indonesian civilians in this respect. The PMI now draws its leadership from ur- ban and Western-educated sectors of the Moslem community and from elements engaged in trade, manufacturing, and cash cropping. Its greatest concentration of support is in West Java and in the Moslem regions of non-Javanese areas, es- pecially Sumatra. SECRET Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927A008900010002-4 SECRET The PMI's leadership has been divided be- tween those,willing to cooperate closely with the government and those who propose to develop a definite identity. It was further split last October when the army encouraged an unsuccessful intra- party "coup." The present chairman, imposed by the government a few months ago, is unpopular with his party and is only now beginning to receive reluctant pledges of loyalty from organiza- tional components. By its own admission, the PMI expects to win. only a small portion of the popular vote. The July elections may well mark the demise, for all practical purposes, of some of the six small parties in Indonesia. In its paternalistic way, however, the government has provided some recognition even for failures, and 10 seats have been reserved in congress for groups that are unable to elect a candidate to Parliament. The six include a declining nationalist party that formerly received significant army support- Association of Supporters of Indonesian Inde- pendence (IPKI); two Moslem parties-the Islamic Union Party (PSII) and the Movement for Ex- pansion of Islam (PERTI); Murba-the so-called national Communist party which is also in a marked state of decline; and two Christian par- ties-the Christian Party, which is Protestant and tends to align itself with the PNI, and the Cath- olic Party, which is close to the government and to SEKBER GOLKAR. Of the six, the PSI I, the Catholic Party, and the Christian Party have the best chances of winning a few seats in non- Javanese areas. The once large Communist Party (PKI), which was crushed and banned after the abortive coup of 1965, barely has a working organization. The vote is denied to former members of the party and its affiliated front groups who, accord- ing to the Communists, totaled from 12 to 16 million in 1965. Some party and front group members reportedly have joined other parties over the course of the last six years. Their natural home would be the left wing of the PNI, but there have been reports of small numbers joining other parties as well, including SEKBER GOLKAR, either for safety's sake or as a delib- erate penetration. In any event, at this point in history, those Communists that do vote must vote for non-Communist candidates. Their preferences may swell PNI returns, but because untoward gains by political parties will, by all odds, be countered in some way by the government, the addition should have little significance. When General Suharto, then still commander of the army, assumed the presidency in March 1967, the Indonesian Army achieved greater and more effective participation in government than ever before in its 22-year role of nation building. Although Suharto has since relinquished com- mand of the army, he remains the minister of defense and as such is commander in chief of the armed forces. In the 23-man cabinet, the army holds three other portfolios, and the navy and air force hold one each. The army and the other services are well represented in all departments at subministerial levels and in industrial and agricul- tural state enterprises. Army officers serve as governors in 14 of the nation's 26 provinces, and junior officers and noncommissioned officers hold a substantial proportion of positions in local administration. Military appointees constitute 18 percent of the membership of Parliament and hold approximately half of the nation's ambas- sadorial posts. Although civilian participation is considerable and effective, particularly in the economic sector, both specific and ultimate gov- ernment control is in the hands of the army. Moreover, the inefficiency of the bureaucracy is such that Suharto relies.considerably on the army hierarchy for administrative assistance. Since the election law stipulates that no member of the military can either vote or run for Special Report SECRET Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927A008900010002-4 SECRET office (although members of the military may be appointed to administrative or parliamentary positions), the government began casting about in early 1970 for a vehicle through which it could dominate the elections without violating the let- ter, if not the spirit, of the law. It seemed to face one of two choices: to come to terms with one of the political parties, logically the secular National Party, or select a heretofore nonpolitical "func- tional" group, as its undeclared standard bearer. The army must have reasoned that it would be risky to reach terms with a political party inas- much as there would be no assurance of con- tinued support once the party was elected and there would also be the question of division of the spoils. It therefore decided that the better choice lay in developing a "functional" vehicle, and it settled on the army-affiliated Joint Secre- tariat of Functional Groups (SEKBER GOL- KAR). Ostensibly nonpolitical, functional groups such as students, laborers, women, and farmers have long been a feature of the Indonesian politi- cal scene. Former President Sukarno at one time used them as a means of diluting the power of the political parties in Parliament, and both the army and the PKI developed their own groups to rein- force their respective political positions. The functional groups have acquired a largely un- deserved mystique as the untainted voices of the "real" Indonesian people. When SEKBER GOLKAR was tapped in 1970, it was a loosely coordinated mass of some 269 organizations including army-affiliated labor unions, rural credit associations, veterans', women's and student groups, a few scattered pro- fessional organizations, and one or two personal vehicles of enterprising generals. Although it has been refurbished, given a military superstructure and considerable funds, it remains a hodgepodge of disparate elements. Its greatly expanded mem- bership has been achieved largely by proselyting among groups attached to regular parties and by the wholesale enlistment of national and pro- vincial government employees. Its steam-roller Special Report tactics and its accumulation of numerical strength and political prestige spring not from its innate appeal and organizational drive but basically from army muscle and financial and administrative as- sistance from the Ministry of Home Affairs. Its goal is half-180-of the elected parliamentary seats which, with the 100 appointed members, would give the government a 60-percent majority in the new Parliament. If the parties do better than anticipated, SEKBER GOL.KAR may have to be content with merely a plurality, in which case it will have to rely on developing further support from among party contingents within Parliament. SEKBER GOLKAR is active at all political levels and in a variety of ways-~-igning up entire organizations, gaining the endorsement of a single influential person who then calls on the public to follow his lead, staging sometimes elaborate, of- ten corny theatricals. It has tried to cut a broad swath through organized Indonesian life and to include under its banner groups of all non-Com- munist political and religious or secular persua- sions. It counts on making itself chiefly felt, how- ever, at village and district levels, where local officials are essentially father figures. In areas where military personnel hold local jobs, SEK- BER GOLKAR's job is relatively easy; the mili- tary officials simply instruct the people in their districts how to vote. When civilians who are more or less loyal to political parties hold these local posts, strategy requires that these individuals be converted to SEKBER GOLKAR; the govern- ment then assumes that the local population will follow suit. Methods of persuasion range from straight- forward physical threats to relatively subtle forms of intimidation. One tactic being used in Java is to threaten the village headman with the loss of his right to use communal land unless he re- nounces party ties, professes loyalty to SECRET Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927A008900010002-4 Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927A008900010002-4 SECRET GOLKAR, and enlists additional support for GOLKAR from among those in his jurisdiction. He is told his efforts will be closely observed. Faced with economic ruin, the hapless headman is likely to use his considerable influence to stimu- late a pro-GOLKAR vote. Another tactic has been to obstruct the cam- paigns of the contesting parties. Both GOLKAR and army personnel have pre-empted premises where parties planned to rally, harassed gather- ings, arrested party officials on real or flimsy accusations, and prevented busloads of followers from entering areas where meetings were to be held on the basis of some official technicality.25x1 Party reaction to SEKBER GOLKAR be- havior ranges from capitulation and despair to anger and bitterness. Most of the parties have openly criticized the government's pressure tac- tics in behalf of GOLKAR and, surprisingly, the Indonesian Catholic Church in early June ap- pealed to the government to eschew intimidation and conduct a free and secret ballot. The PNI and NU have been particulary bitter in attacking GOLKAR methods and have indulged in what must be extravagant tales of intimidation. The NU, for example, has reported that aged Moslem priests have been told to dig their graves unless they registered with GOLKAR, and that engaged couples have been denied marriage licenses unless they agreed to vote for the government party. In some parts of Java, PNI and NU officials are reported to have told their followers to regis- ter with GOLKAR but to vote on 3 July for their own party. (In several straw votes held in Java, in which the secret ballot was observed, the PNI won.) How successful a tactic this may be remains to be seen. Although the election law calls for a secret ballot, there is no guarantee that this will be enforced. The common expectation is that the farther away from Djakarta the more open the polling booth will be. Still, the possibility remains that GOLKAR's tactics may be counterproduc- tive, and that it will register a lower vote on 3 July than it anticipates. The Campaign Substantive issues have had little impact on the campaign, in part because the government has dictated the subjects to be discussed, to wit, the 1945 constitution, the five-year economic ~X1 velopment plan, and Indonesia's Five Principles (nationalism, internationalism democracy, social justice. and belief in God). Although the formal campaign did not begin until 27 April and lasts until 26 June, all parties- particularly GOLKAR and the PNI-were active by the beginning of the year. In Java, the PNI's references to Sukarno have been curbed repeat- edly by the government. The NU, which felt the depredations of SEKBER GOLKAR later than the other parties and may have suffered least, has been the loudest in its criticism of government tactics. The PNI and the NU have resisted GOL- KAR as firmly as they dare without provoking significant government action against them, but the other parties generally have just gone through the motions of campaigning. Of the ten slates of competing candidates, GOLKAR's is by far the most impressive. Of its 539 candidates, 100 are bona fide "new order" leaders. They include five cabinet ministers and the wives of several governors, army territorial commanders, and of at least one minister. The most colorful and energetic GOLKAR campaigner has been Foreign Minister Adam Malik, who by all accounts has been quite a success in non- Javanese areas. Special Report - 11 - SECRET Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927AO08900010002-4 SECRET nesian Government intends to win the elections, freely if possible, but with more questionable In the sense of effecting significant change, means if that proves necessary. A flagrantly rigged Indonesian elections are unlikely to make any election could promote student demonstrations difference. It seems fairly obvious that the Indo- and an unfavorable press campaign, but it is not SECRET Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927AO08900010002-4 Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927A008900010002-4 SECRET likely that there would be any real trouble. An administration tarnished by the public knowledge of a manipulated vote would make for increased resentment, but the political parties would still have no effective way to translate their frustra- tion into action. The election will simply confirm the present government in office, and its policies will continue. Beyond this confirmation of the status quo, the government apparently harbors the hope that elections will be of assistance in the task of re- structuring the political party system. It hopes that the exercise will weaken the political parties and will encourage additional defections from the parties and their affiliated organizations to SEK- BER GOLKAR. GOLKAR strategists apparently are now thinking in terms of one government- Special Report sponsored party that would enlist support from all the significant groups in Indonesian society. The present parties would presumably remain in existence and would continue to have some peripheral influence, but they would become completely overshadowed by a large and vigorous GOLKAR. It seems unlikely, however, that any rapid or major moves will be pushed. Rather, once elec- tions are over, the government will watch the dust settle and will interfere only in the event of unfavorable reactions. In any event, a move seems to be afoot toward at least experimentation with a single mass party. How or whether it develops will depend on how much attention the govern- ment is willing to continue to divert from its priority ac- tion. 25 fl SECRET Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927A008900010002-4 Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927AO08900010002-4 Approved For Release 2006/08/22 : CIA-RDP79-00927AO08900010002-4