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Simplification
of Political Parties
The
Government Manifesto of November 3, 1945, opened the
way to a rapid growth of political parties. Soon a
multi-party system emerged with parties of different
ideologies, ranging from nationalism to socialism,
religion and even Marxism/Leninism. Hence, the political
structure developed into a liberal democracy that
was a complete departure from the type of democracy
envisaged by Pancasila. With sharply conflicting ideologies,
political rivalry was the order of the day and a stable
Government was out of the question. With a total of
24 political parties and their fractions, cabinets
could only be formed on the basis of a shaky compromise
between the strongest parties. In point of fact, coalition
cabinets were formed and dissolved very often. The
administration was a complete shambles and development
was a far cry.
The first and only general election ever held during
the rule of the Old Order took place in 1955. Even
that election did not produce a strong cabinet with
a solid back up in Parliament. On the contrary, because
political conditions continued to deteriorate, the
President ordered the formation of a Constituent Assembly
to draft a new constitution. However, as mentioned
earlier, this only ended up in a total deadlock, which
led the president to take all the power of the state
into his own hands under the pretext of guided democracy.
Having learned from the experience of the unlimited
multiparty system of the post, the New Order Government,
which came into office in 1967, decided to simplify
the political system along the following lines:
-
In order to minimize ideological conflicts between
political organizations, all political organizations
shall adopt Pancasila as their sole basis principle.
-
To simplify the political system, particularly for
the purpose of choosing a political organization
by the people in general elections it was felt that
the number of these organizations should be reduced.
In the past, villages were made the bases of political
activities and maneuvers, most notably in the heyday
of the Indonesian Communist Party. This adversely
affected the social and economic life of the village
populations. Hence, it would be desirable to free
villages from the activities of political organizations.
Furthermore, the large number of organizations has
been reduced by the fusion of parties and their affiliated
organizations into two political parties - Partai
Persatuan Pembangunan (The United Development Party
or Partai Persatuan) and Partai Demokrasi Indonesia
(the Indonesian Democracy Party or PDI), and one Functional
Group or Golongan Karya (Golkar). Partai Persatuan
is a fusion of Nahdlatul Ulama (the Moslem Scholars
Party), Parmusi (the Moslem Party), PSII (the Islamic
Confederation) and PERTI (the Islamic Union). PDI
is a fusion of the former PNI (the Nationalist Party),
the Catholic Party, the Christian (Protestant) Party,
the Indonesian Independence Party, and Partai Murba
(the People's Party). Golkar accommodates the aspirations
and political rights and duties of functional groups
that are not affiliated with either party, namely
civil servants, retired members of the Armed Forces,
women's organizations, professional groups, farmers,
student, etc.
By virtue of the 1983 Guidelines of State Policy and
on the basis of Act No. 3 of 1985, Pancasila has finally
been adopted as the one and only ideological principle
upon which all political organizations base their
activities.
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