Author: Ahmad Cholis Hamzah*
In the past, foreign powers similar to the Netherlands, Portugal, Great Britain and Japan colonized Indonesia for a very long time, so yow will discover the names of many heroes from each province of this archipelagic country of 17,000 islands that fought for independence. Most Indonesian students know a few of their names by heart. They are known for “National Hero”. However, there are several other “hero” titles within the country, for instance “Hero Without a Medal” refers to teachers who earn a modest salary but sincerely want to offer education to their students. Many of them survive distant islands and have inferior infrastructure, yet through tireless efforts they travel long distances to succeed in their beloved students. These teachers educate individuals who will grow to be wealthy businessmen, successful parliamentarians, government officials and even presidents in the long run, and yet they ask for nothing in return. That’s why they’re called Heroes and not using a Medal.
Indonesians also know other heroes, similar to “Heroes of the Revolution”, referring to army generals who were brutally killed and murdered by members of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) in 1965 during a failed coup. The term “Heroes of November 10” then refers back to the 1000’s of Indonesian freedom fighters who fought fiercely against British forces in November 1945 in Surabaya, the country’s second-largest city.
Now Indonesians are beginning to get used to a brand new hero title – “Heroes of Democracy”, which refers to civilians who died of fatigue and stress while participating in “the world’s most complex elections”. Since the April 17, 2019 election, it has been a large election involving nearly 6,000,000 election staff and over 800,000 polling stations across the country. The Indonesian Election Commission announced that ten days after the election (as I write this text), as many as 272 election staff/officials died from overwork and over 1,800 others fell unwell.
The election was an enormous undertaking because all of the elections – presidential, national and provincial, in addition to local/municipal and senatorial – all took place at the identical time, with roughly 193 million eligible voters participating in three time zones from Sumatra to within the west to Papua within the east, over 5,000 kilometers away. More than 245,000 candidates participate in 20,000 sets across the country.
Such simultaneous elections are the primary in Indonesia to abolish early elections, which were deemed too costly and exhausting state, provincial and native government budgets.
However, these trial-and-error elections turned out to be unhealthy work for many who worked on the polls, as they worked almost 24 hours a day from preparing invitations to voters of their areas, erecting tents for polling stations, and counting hundreds of thousands of ballots by hand.
Civil society similar to NGOs and universities have raised concerns about this “democratic experiment”. For example, Budi Wijayanto, Secretary General of the Airlangga University Alumni Association in Surabaya, in his association letter urged the federal government to review such unhealthy selections. He was not the just one to specific such a voice, similar concerns were shared by many distinguished leaders, including the Ministry of Interior.
Let’s hope that in the long run there will likely be no more “Heroes of Democracy” in Indonesia.
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*Airlangga University graduates
Surabaya Indonesia, University of London, UK
Airlangga University Vice-Chancellor’s Special Staff for International Affairs.
