JAKARTA - President Joko Widodo has been requested to draw a lesson from the recent political turmoil occuring in the country. The President is asked to be able to work with different interest groups while taking a more careful stance in appointing chief of national police or other law enforcers in the future.
Such issues emerged in the monthly annual discussion held by alumni association of Universitas Gadjah Mada on Saturday (21/2) in Jakarta, presenting a senior researcher from Indonesian Science Instititute, Mochtar Pabottinggi, editor-in-chief of Kompas newspaper, Budiman Tanuredjo, Director of LP3Y, Ashadi Siregar, and political observer, Yudi Latif, Ph.D, moderated by Banu Astono.
Mochtar said the President needs to draw a lesson from the political turmoil in the past month. In his opinion, chief of national police and law enforcers to be appointed require not only competence, but also integrity, saying “Such things cannot be compromised.”
In the future, he said, the President needs to be more of a statesman, not a politician while securing the police institution from certain senior officials that are misusing authorities in legal enactment efforts.
Budiman shared these views, saying the political turmoil is not apart from the problems happening at the elite. “This situation threatens the government’s political modality that had been established relatively well since the beginning,” he said.
He viewed that consolidation between the elites is necessary to resolve problems affecting the state. “Unfortunately, the current political crisis has shown us that the tensions do not end up at a clear direction. The tensions only affirmed the fact that we have more politicians than statesmen,” he added.