July 24, 2001	atimes.com

Editorials Southeast Asia: Where there's no law ... ... there's no justice - and where there's neither, there won't be economic advancement. Or - looking at the state of governance in the region - you might say, two down, two to go. After the illegal, unconstitutional late January seizure of power of Vice President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo in the Philippines, it now apparently has become Indonesian Vice President Megawati Sukarnoputri's turn to ride to the presidency on the shoulders of a rebellious military. We have previously, and on several occasions, written that it was time for Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid to resign. He chose - wrongly - instead to declare a state of emergency, decree a "freeze" on parliamentary bodies and to call for fresh elections in a year's time. But think of "Gus Dur's" actions as you may, think of the pretext for the emergency declaration as self-serving (as you should), the Monday morning 1 am state-of-emergency declaration nonetheless appeared to be within the Indonesian president's constitutional rights. Displaced now - in fact, but not in law - by a parliamentary assembly no longer formally in existence, but backed up in its extra-legal actions by security forces disobeying orders of their commander-in-chief, Wahid is stripped of power and a new president has been - unlawfully - installed. Early expectations that Wahid's rule might lead Indonesia onto the path of constitutional democracy and economic recovery were thwarted some time ago. The nearly blind Muslim cleric, perhaps further hampered by strokes he suffered prior to assuming the presidency, has proved ineffective in his administration of the affairs of state. However, with any good sense and sense of constitutional principles and the rule of law (and the significance of the preservation of such for Indonesia's future), the lady that now takes over as president and who said and did nothing throughout (as is her wont) and the man who talks incessantly and would do better to shut his busy-body trap on occasion (People's Consultative Assembly Speaker Amien Rais) should have forestalled the present turn of events. Southeast Asia did not need yet another illegally installed leader. What has become the sad rule in the hopeless "people power" (mob rule), Catholic-clergy and oligarchical-family dominated feudal Philippines did not bear repetition. But repeated it has been; and much as in the Philippines, the daughter of a former president has taken over in Indonesia; and also as in the Philippines, a Supreme Court ruling has given the proceedings a thin veneer of legitimacy. Having come to power in most questionable manner, Megawati's ability to rule (which many observers have always doubted) is now severely burdened from the outset. Moreover, she will need to look over her shoulder and guard against further power plays by the man who engineered her accession, assembly speaker Rais. Rais, a defeated presidential candidate in 1999, has openly stated his ambition to become president at a future date and will not likely rest until that ambition is fulfilled. As serious succession issues and uncertainties also exist in Malaysia and Thailand, Southeast Asia's four major economies are all now plagued with intractable political troubles precisely at a time when even legitimate and decisive leadership would find it difficult in the extreme to keep them afloat. Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad's one-time successor-designate, Anwar Ibrahim, has been jailed on dubious charges. Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra is awaiting the outcome of a Constitutional Court trial which may ban him from office for five years. In neither country are firm and tested procedures in place to guarantee smooth governance transition. Clearly, under such circumstances and as all emerging markets are already under a cloud as the result of the Argentina debt crisis, badly needed foreign funds will not find their way to Southeast Asia. Mutually reinforcing economic and political and social woes will see the region's fortunes tumble. There exists the very real danger that much of the economic gain of the 1987-97 decade will become undone. But this time, don't blame currency speculators; blame speculators in the currency of self-serving political ambition and disregard for the rule of law. ((c)2001 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com for information on our sales and syndication policies.)

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