Belated Reformasi in South Sulawesi, Indonesia — The Declining Political Power of the Golkar Party in 2004

Abstract

A series of elections in 2004 clearly and finally changed the political landscape of the South Sulawesi province, one of the politically most conservative areas in Indonesia. Golkar, the dominant political party during the authoritarian Suharto regime, still governed the post- Suharto local politics of South Sulawesi because it won a majority in the democratic 1999 election. But the situation has changed in 2004. In April, the Golkar party failed to gain the predicted 70% of the votes and just got less than 45% in the general election.
In July and September, Golkar’s presidential candidate only got approximately 15% and 13% of the votes respectively. The question this paper addresses is why Golkar’s political machine worked less effectively and efficiently in South Sulawesi.
The answer lies in the political opportunism of the local elite and the highly vertical nature of social relationships in South Sulawesi. The opportunism was triggered by a series of local gubernatorial/district head elections, prior to the 2004 elections. In the hunt for power the Golkar elite was split, motivating many of them to run for non-Golkar parties. They fought each other as they sought posts as governors and district heads. As the elite showed their political opportunism and appeared not to care much about their party, their clients followed suit. Golkar started to fall apart from ‘above’ and ‘within’ prior to the 2004 elections.
In the general election in April 2004, Golkar was no longer as solid as before and finally failed to win a majority in South Sulawesi. A part of Golkar elite moved to other Islamic and regionalist political parties and successfully obtained some local assembly seats. And the younger elite who failed to become local Golkar parliamentarians became politicians from other parties. Diversification of party politics helped the young elite to gain access to political power.
In the direct presidential elections in July and September, Golkar as an institution did not function at all. The politically and economically most influential patron from Golkar in South Sulawesi, Jusuf Kalla, changed sides suddenly and became the vice-presidential candidate for a small party with the justification that his opportunistic attitude was good for the nation. The political acrobatics of this significant patron had a snowball effect and his (‘would-be’) clients rushed to his side and the Golkar political machine collapsed with just about a quarter of the total vote.
The decline of Golkar and the rise of other parties could signify either the belated collapse of the Suharto regime, or the belated coming of reformasi (political reform) in South Sulawesi, but importantly, it was not caused by voters’ rational choice of supporting policies and programmes provided by political parties during the elections. The decline of Golkar and the diversification of party politics came simply because clients followed the opportunistic political choice of their patrons.