I DON'T know about
you, but these days I'm beginning to wonder about Australia
The newspapers are filled with melodramatic stories about
how hopeless the Prime Minister is, what Caucus members are saying about her
behind her back, what Kevin Rudd is up to and how the latest Government
announcement on health or industry policy has turned out to be an own goal.
Whatever. I'm no supporter of the Government but even I am
getting bored with these stories.
There are a plethora of more important things for us to
contemplate than political gossip.
Let me give you an example.
It never ceases to a amaze me how little interest we show as
a nation in our next-door neighbours.
Sure, we enjoy American films and culture. And we speak the
same language. Certainly, a growing China now takes around one quarter of all
our exports, so its prosperity is our prosperity. And yes, there are the lands
of our ancestors which still mean a lot to us.
But the only way our security will be directly challenged is
if our own neighbourhood falls apart. That's what happened in the 1940s when
the Japanese swept through Indonesia and the South Pacific attempting to take
over Papua New Guinea.
We need to make sure those countries remain stable and
secure. More than that, we need to engage constructively with Indonesia and the
small and often unstable countries of the South Pacific. Paul Keating as prime
minister made the decisive point; if the relationship with our neighbour,
Indonesia, collapsed, we'd have to spend twice as much as we do on defence.
Frankly, it is astonishing that our media and the public
more generally write, talk and think so little about Indonesia.
I was told recently that a senior member of the SA Cabinet
had to ask where Yogyakarta was! I'm too discreet to tell you who he is. It's
not only a large city in Java but it's the cultural capital of Java.
Indonesia is our neighbour and it's huge. It has 10 times
the population of Australia but with a smaller GDP. It is 6000km from one end
of the Indonesian archipelago to the other and it straddles some of the world's
most important and sensitive trade routes.
Over the years, our relations with Indonesia have been
troubled. During the Sukarno era, Australia's relationship with Indonesia was
tense and at times bellicose, particularly at the time of confrontation between
Indonesia and Malaysia.
For many Australians, the arrival via a coup d'etat of
president Suharto was seen as a godsend. Sure he was a dictator but he was
anti-communist during the Cold War and he seemed interested enough in a stable
relationship with Australia.
Well, you'll remember that Paul Keating invested heavily in
his relationship with Suharto. Frankly, he was right to do so. But surely Tim
Fischer went too far when, much to my amazement, he announced Suharto was the
greatest figure of the second half of the 20th century!
Suharto was the embodiment of that old American saying:
"He may be a son of a bitch but at least he's our son of a bitch."
When I met with him in Jakarta from time to time I found him austere and
patronising. But at least he wanted to keep things with Australia on an even
keel.
But of all the presidents Indonesia has had since
independence, the most overtly pro-Australian has been the current president,
Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.
He was the co-ordinating minister for security at the time
of the first Bali bombing. It was out of that tragedy that John Howard and I
were able to build a strong personal relationship with him.
I well recall the moment in Jakarta in January 2005 just
after we pledged $1 billion to Indonesia to help fund the post-tsunami
reconstruction. President Yudhoyono came across the room and took my hand in
both of his hands. With tears in his eyes he said he would never forget
Australia's generosity to Indonesia in its time of need.
Now you can have a debate about how well we've handled
relations with Indonesia over the past five or so years. The big point is this.
In just over a year's time, President Yudhoyono's term will come to an end.
That's all the time we have left to deal with this most pro-Australian of
presidents of our huge and vital next-door neighbour.
Once he goes, it will be, for Australia, the end of a golden
era.
Australia has to make the most of this period, because no
one knows yet who the next president will be.
Of the current likely candidates, any one of them could
present Australia with some difficulties. For a start, the current favourite is
the son-in-law of president Suharto - a former general called Prabowo Subianto.
He was the head of the Indonesian special forces known as Kopassus in the
1990s.
Not to put too fine a point on it, Prabowo was wildly
unpopular with many Australian NGOs because of alleged human rights abuses in
East Timor. He is unlikely to be a fan of our great country.
Now, General Prabowo may not win the election but the point
is this: Whoever does, the golden era of the Yudhoyono administration is
drawing to a close.
Australian leaders should be thinking about this. It matters.
It matters because we need a stable, friendly and
economically prosperous Indonesia as a next-door neighbour.
Yet you seldom hear a word about Indonesia unless it relates
to one of our foolish drug traffickers locked up in a Balinese jail.
Or unless it's the latest saga in the boat people scandal.
Well, I'll tell you this; without the co-operation of the
Indonesian government, we have no hope of stopping the boats. That's just one
more reason why we should care about who wins next year's Indonesian presidential
election.
Alexander Downer was foreign affairs minister in the Howard
government from 1996 to 2007
No comments:
Post a Comment