“Series of Seminar on Indonesia’s 2009 Elections”

For the third time since 1999, RSIS will host a seminar series covering the Indonesia’s General Elections and Presidential Elections. Though the leading protagonists remain the last remnants of Suharto era leaders and the 1998 reformasi elite, this election remains critical as the outcomes will very much shape, or at least lay the groundwork, for Indonesian politics up to 2014 when a new generation of leaders will emerge. With the election campaign currently underway one interesting observation is the large numbers of younger generation politicians entering the fray leading us to conclude that there will be significant turnover of legislators allowing the possibility that new interests and agendas being introduced into future legislative proceedings. There is also a possibility that President Yudhoyono’s Partai Demokrat may have a larger presence in Parliament allowing the president far greater scope in not only shaping the composition of his cabinet but more importantly giving him the advantage of pushing through his policy agenda. The Indonesia Programme has accordingly identified the Elections 2009 as its key signature event for the current Workyear 09/10.

The Programme understands that due to the nature of contemporary Indonesian politics a mere handful of keynote speeches delivered by the Presidential candidates—while important—is by no means sufficient for those in our policy community keen understand the key trends materializing from the Elections. Based on this objective, the Programme proposes to host an all-encompassing series of seminars dealing with issues that range from the framework of the election system; coalition building in the run-up to the presidential election; and political developments in the aftermath of the Election.

The proposed series will cover a number of issues that are clustered into four main areas of analysis: firstly, the swing voters and the 2009 Parliamentary Election; secondly, the Election system that set the framework and challanges; thirdly, the visions of Vice President Elect and finally the analysis of both the programmes and performance of the new administration after the first 100 days. In total the series will consist of six to seven rounds of seminar depending on the number of candidates running in the first round of the Presidential election. The Programme believes that this particular format of seminars is the best strategy to allow for an overreaching and holistic overview on Indonesia’s 2009 Indonesia’s elections.

Election Series Round I: “Swing Voters and the 2009 Indonesian Parliamentary Election” - 23 January 2009
Prof. R. William Liddle, Ohio State University.

Election Series Round II: “Indonesia’s 2009 General Elections: Framework and Challenges” - 12 February 2009
Mrs. Sri Nuryanti, Member of the National General Elections Commission (KPU).
Mrs. Wirdyaningsih, Member of the General Elections Supervisory Board (Bawaslu).
Dr. Yudi Latif, Executive Director of the Reform Institute, Jakarta.

Election Series Round III: “Indonesia beyond the 2009 Elections: Prospects and Challenges”- 28 July 2009
H.E. Prof. Dr. Boediono, Vice President designate of the Republic of Indonesia.