Author: Ahmad Harris *
Resigning is a common thing done by leaders in Japan. One of the Japanese prime ministers, in 2011, announced his resignation because he discovered Japan in the aftermath of the Tsunami in March 2011. Japanese people are accustomed to digging firmly to the culture aka Bushido, namely the Samurai code of ethics consisting of values of integrity, courage, honesty and guarding honor. One of the values contained in Bushido is Meiyo, maintaining the good name of yourself with respectful behavior. On the basis of Meiyo’s value, the leader in Japan resigns from his position if you fail to carry out your duties. Less, according to them, resignation is an attempt to maintain a good name through recognition of the failures that have been made.
Unfortunately, Meiyo’s value has never been in a dictionary of leaders in Indonesia. A leader who has made a mistake often insists on maintaining his position. Worse, some people who have made mistakes later, proudly nominate themselves as candidates for leadership in Indonesia. One of them, Prabowo, one of the masterminds behind the 1998 kidnapping, again ran for the 2019 presidential election. Instead of being embarrassed by his past, he said bravely back in politics. However, it is undeniable that the Indonesian people did have very small individuals who were able to forgive and encourage the kidnappers of activists in 1998.
At least, Prabowo has now been forgiven by 30% of the Indonesian people who are also loyal supporters. Maybe they want to give Prabowo the second chance to serve the country of Indonesia. Unfortunately, in the process of the 2019 Presidential Election, Prabowo again made various embarrassing mistakes. One of them is his inaccuracy in revealing the Hoax Ratna Sarumpaet scandal. When Indonesia was focusing on handling the Palu earthquake, he appeared as a late hero who asked for justice for Ratna Sarumpaet. Not only was he motivated by justice, he also brought political intentions by accusing others as masterminds of the persecution of Ratna Sarumpaet. Unfortunately, after the truth was revealed, there was no discourse heard from Prabowo’s camp to download it as a sign of apology.
Shortly after that, Prabowo again uttered a request that was of a formality nature. For his campaign, most of the residents of Boyolali took to the streets and performed rituals to protest the meaning of Prabowo which was considered harassing. In fact, over the situation, Boyolali residents expressed their attitude not to support Prabowo in the 2019 Presidential Election. Within a period of less than a month, Prabowo apologized for the second time. However, he also did not resign and only arrived at a formal apology.
Finally, the most severe of the two errors is his attitude in intimidating the media. According to Prabowo, the media is a foreign stooge who wants to destroy the Republic of Indonesia because it does not report 11 million people who participated in the 212 reunion at the National Monument. Either where the number came from, surely Prabowo wanted the media to echo it. In a way, Prabowo’s behavior reminds us of the Department of Information as an institution that regulates the media to suit the interests of the authorities in the New Order. Instead of making Indonesia glorious again (Make Indonesia Great Again), Prabowo seems to want to make Orba Jaya back.
Unfortunately, he was still unable to realize that throughout the 2019 Presidential Election there were 3 mistakes he had made. He started from the Hoax scandal, harassment, and intimidation of democracy during political contestation, 2019 Election. Even though Pak Prabowo was not of Japanese descent, at least the cultural imitation resigned in the Japanese style to safeguard your honor and good name while making amends.
*) FISIP students at the Dharma Agung University