Suharto came into power in 1966, where he insisted that the Republic of Indonesia needed to forget about its political divisions and concentrate on economic development. Coming from an extremely wealthy family, he was naturally accustomed to having money. His goal as president was to increase Indonesia’s overall economic wealth. Yet when he was obtaining this money, his greed and power made it clear that he was trying to increase his personal economic state rather than the Republic’s. Suharto’s plans were originally intended to help the Republic make its way out of poverty and make the country stable as far as economics was concerned. The people of Indonesia supported the ideas of Suharto up until the point to which his ideas were becoming more selfish and corrupt. The International Monetary Fund (IMF), which helps countries with financial responsibilities, was a major part of Indonesian economy. President Suharto chose to oppose the IMF and believed that he and his staff could handle all financial matters without the help of this department. The IMF disagreed with many choices that Suharto, but the ones that put Indonesia in such a bad state were his decisions based on nepotism and collusion. President Suharto appointed his lifelong friend Mohammad Hasan and his eldest daughter known as Tutut as ministers of economy in Suharto’s 36-member cabinet. Cameron Barr, a writer of the Christian Science Magazine states that many democracy activists refer to Suharto’s 36-member cabinet as the “business-as-usual Cabinet”. This alludes to the fact that throughout Suharto’s reign as president, he constantly chose his officials through unfair biases and favored people of military background and those within his family lines. Suharto exemplified this type of nepotism and corruption throughout his presidency. The biggest problem that surrounds this situation is that the students who reside in Indonesia want a more democratic government, which Suharto was everything but. He represented a self-sufficient government that would take care of itself without the help of any outside services. Although throughout the beginning of Suharto’s reign, the economy continue to rise, after East Timor gained its independence and separated itself from the Republic of Indonesia, the country suffered an extreme decrease in finances. Lukman Sutrisno, a prominent sociologist in Indonesia spoke upon the problems that Indonesia and Suharto face, “He has to face the reality that if he doesn’t get the money there’s going to be a big, big riot.” In general, the people of Indonesia had split mindsets. They disagreed and were angered with Suharto for not complying with the IMF although he increased Indonesia’s economic standing. Yet they were easily frustrated when the country lost its money. If Suharto would have just complied with the IMF, the people of Indonesia would at least be in a stable position, in regards to their governmental unrest.
Money is a powerful object and Suharto did everything in his power to obtain it yet when he got it, he chose not to share it with any outside organizations or in most cases his own people. Suharto’s greed and corruption led to the Republic having a much better economic state, yet the people of Indonesia thoroughly disagreed with his actions and in turn was the reason for many riots and violent actions among the people of Indonesia. In one case, in over 20 separate cities, riots broke out due to the monopolies that were occurring with food prices.
Suharto, being of a military background, knew the importance of his power. His ideas were noble in the sense that he wanted to make the Republic better in the sense of economics and country standing. But his ideas were solely representative of statistics, he wanted to increase Indonesia’s statistics, not help the people. He was out to make the country look good at all costs, with blatant disregard to his people. His overall thought process was to impress the world, not his people. But making the people of Indonesia angry had no lasting effect on Suharto, seeing that the way the government was structured, he did not need the votes of the people. Their was never anyone who dared to challenge Suharto for presidency. The opposition is divided, marginalized, and imprisoned and the media is kept tame, they are chastened by the government which revokes licenses, and persecutes people for defaming the president. The law that gives Suharto the control over the media is written very vaguely, which means Suharto breaks no laws by silencing his opposition. Power was the key to Suharto, he thrived on it knowing that his power would allow him to make the rules to change the economy. Despite his controversial ways, he maintained the power of his country and people until the country of East Timor was granted its independence. The loss showed weakness in Suharto’s military command as well as his structured government. The people of Indonesia began to riot and this made Suharto’s plan of looking better to the world a plan of myth.
Aside from Suharto’ military outlook, he discriminated highly against women. Being a man of a strong religious background, he believed that women were created as lesser beings than man. Suharto agreed with the Holy Qur’an which stated that all women should be submissive and politically passive. During his presidency, he banned one of Indonesia’s most influential women’s movement known as the Gerwani. The Gerwani, a movement that was part of the Communist Party of Indonesia (PKI), is stated by Saskia E. Wieringa, a writer in the Journal of Women’s History, as the most powerful women’s movement in the world. After the Gerwani had been banned, it directly influenced all other women’s rights organizations and was cause to have them more heavily restricted. Women who belonged either to the Gerwani or any other women’s movement were known as the “communist whores”, a term given to the women who believed that they held a higher place in society than pleasing men and standing along their side. Wieringa states in her article, “The Birth of the New Order State in Indonesia: Sexual Politics and Nationalism”, the following about Suharto’s governmental regime, “Their wrath seemed specifically aimed at women who had breached the kodrat wanita (women’s moral code), an ideology that suggested women should be meek, submissive and politically passive.” This code specifically states that women should be degraded to the level of servitude, and essentially slavery. In the beginning of Suharto’s presidency, the only way that women could obtain any sort of power or respect was to serve the men in the Indonesian Army. Women would come out to the battle field to sew stripes and other insignia onto a soldier’s uniform; they would then have to sleep in the same residence as the soldiers and were woken up each morning to the sound of screaming voices and bullet shots. After the battle was over for the day, the women would perform sexual acts for the soldiers. Suharto allowed this activity to go on for the thirty three years he was in office.
In conclusion, throughout Suharto’s presidency he morally degraded a various array of his population. He showed a very high bias towards people who served in the military and those of a male gender. He did everything he possibly could to change the outlook of Indonesia’s political and economic state. Despite his efforts, his immoral views caused his people to dislike him as a political figure more and more. The people demonstrated their disagreement through violent protests and revolts. His changes to the country were all statistical, Indonesia’s overall economy rose significantly, yet Suharto showed disregard towards the IMF by not turning in any budget reports or plans. This severely angered the people of Indonesia and in turn caused chaos within the Republic. Thus solidifying my argument that although Suharto, put forth effort into making the Republic stand out, he caused his people to hate him and turned Indonesia into the violent state that it currently resides in. His immoral ways ended up being more destructive towards the country than his increase in economy and military power.
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