Moral and ethics on high ground
Sultan Hamengku Buwono X may be the most popular figure after incumbent Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and Megawati Sukarnoputri. But that’s based on existing popularity survey. The LSI (lembaga Survey Indonesia) puts SBY with 34 percent, Megawati with 24 percent and the Sultan with a mere 7 percent. He says if he’s not popular, he’s happy with that. Besides, he has not declared himself a candidate while the draft legislation (RUU) on elections has yet to be passed. Reading his mind is difficult if you are an elitist or a person educated and trained abroad. He will not be accepted and regarded as feudal or absurdly outdated and out-fashioned. But to the Javanese, he’s a born leader, a king and born to serve. And the Javanese make up the majority of the population. Unlike others, he puts moral and ethics on high ground. He can’t and doesn’t want to run at the moment. Besides he doesn’t have the political vehicle. He’s only a governor under SBY. It would be unethical to run against his boss. On paper, SBY and Megawati are on top. But the two haven’t proved themselves as good leaders. The sultan is now building dialogues with all walks of the Indonesian society and tells people that a leadership will not be successful without a cultural strategy putting moral and ethics as the supreme commander of development instead of Western-style economics. Moral and ethics decadence have caused a great difficulty for the nation difficult to rise from the crisis, poverty and backwardness. But Your Majesty, are you going to give it a try in 2009?
March 11, 2008 at 2:30 pm
Becoming a large investor in Indonesia does not necessarily mean worth giving and a blessing to the country. No doubt foreign corporations help raise state revenues, but they also bring social problems and natural destruction for lack of social responsibility.
Shell operation in South Africa has a bad record. Some big NGOs, among them are working in Indonesia, launder Shell’s money by having their program financed by this UK bloody miner. Indonesian officials were supposed to have drawn the duke of York’s attention to this instead of patting on the back and thinking about imposing new levies.