Supplementary Reading - The Economist Special Report

Ask Adrian if you would like to get hold of the AUDIO VERSIONS of all the following articles.

The Special Report in the latest edition of The Ecomonist is on Indonesia. There are more than ten articles covering various topics. If you're serious about being an Indonesian undergradute studying business or accounting in an international programme, you should really set yourself the target of not only reading all these articles but also going over them very carefully looking for ideas that will help you write.

The first paragraph of each article is as follows: (you can click on the title to see the complete article)

A golden opportunity <<>

WHEN Suharto, Indonesia’s long-serving dictator, fell in 1998 the very integrity of the country seemed in doubt. It faced economic collapse, political chaos and fissile separatist insurgencies in Aceh, Papua and East Timor. Indonesia’s neighbours feared the worst: anarchy within Indonesia; a surge in Islamist extremism; an exodus of desperate boat-people; rampant piracy in some of the world’s busiest shipping lanes.

A golden chance <<>

COUNTRIES generally hit the headlines only when the news is bad. In Indonesia it has often been spectacularly bad. A decade ago there were fears that the country might disintegrate in a welter of violence, piracy and mass migration. Its former dictator, Suharto, set new standards for kleptocracy. As he fell in 1998, the economy collapsed. The Bali bombing of 2002 that killed more than 200 people was one of a series of such attacks, and the lingering danger of Islamic terrorism was recalled by another murderous blast in Jakarta in July this year. The country is prone to natural disasters too, from the tsunami that devastated parts of Sumatra in 2004 to this month’s deadly earthquake in Java.

More of the same, please <<>

ANY young democracy must clear two big hurdles. It must undergo a peaceful transition from a leader to an opponent, and it must see an incumbent win an election without credible cries of foul. Indonesia has now crossed both barriers. In its first direct presidential election in 2004, the incumbent, Megawati Sukarnoputri, lost to Mr Yudhoyono. Miss Megawati, daughter of Indonesia’s founding hero and leader of a tame opposition under Suharto, went into a sulk and boycotted Mr Yudhoyono’s swearing-in. But power was handed over smoothly enough.

Free to air <<>

HAD things turned out differently, Santoso might have been in jail or in exile by now. In the late 1990s, as chairman of the Association of Indonesian Journalists, a union formed to fight the restrictions of the Suharto years, he spent time in hiding. Now he is managing director of a thriving radio station whose programmes are syndicated to 650 stations in Indonesia and to ten other countries. One of the greatest victories of the reformasi movement of 1998 has been the freedom of the press.

Things do not fall apart <<>

THE Suharto regime used to argue that if East Timor became independent, it would set off an archipelagic chain reaction. So when in 1999 East Timor voted for independence, Indonesian soldiers and their local allies responded with a furious burst of arson and violence. With this disaster coming so soon after the Indonesian economy collapsed, there were fears that Indonesia might unravel. To make matters worse, an ethnically, linguistically and culturally diverse archipelago was dominated by Java and the Javanese. It still is.

Tolerance levels <<>

ONE day in June 2007 Dago Simamora, a junior high-school teacher in Palembang in South Sumatra, picked up his nine-year-old son from school. On the way home he was shot dead. His killer scooted away on a motorcycle. The police at first blamed the murder on a land dispute. Only when the culprits were arrested a year later did it emerge that Mr Simamora had been killed because he was a Christian, accused of trying to convert the girls in his class. In April this year ten members of the Palembang jihadist group that killed him were jailed on terrorism charges.

Surprise, surprise <<>

IN RUINS just a decade ago, Indonesia’s economy these days seems a remarkably sturdy structure. Having been worse hit than any other by the Asian economic crisis of 1997-98, it has, by some measures, weathered the global slump of 2008-09 surprisingly well. Economic growth has slowed by less than in most other big countries. In part that is a gauge of its underachievement compared with faster-growing China and India. Indonesia’s GDP growth will decline from 6.1% in 2008 and 6.3% in 2007 to perhaps 4% this year, compared with nearly 8% in China and 6% in India. But given Indonesia’s starting-point a decade ago, that is still impressive.

More than a single swallow <<>

THE best-maintained building in the remote village of Teluk Binjai in Riau province on Sumatra is neither the new, rather Spartan, wooden mosque nor one of the better-off local farmers’ stilt-raised bungalows. It is the home for swallows. A windowless structure, it is studded with rows of dozens of gleaming access chutes. Tapes of alluring music tempt the flighty gadabouts to make themselves at home. Their health-giving nests, once harvested, fetch between 8m and 15m rupiah per kilo in Pekanbaru, the provincial capital, and far more still when they reach their destination: China.

Not making it easy <<>

It does not help that Indonesia is suspicious of foreign investors. It posts a protectionist “negative list” of industries where FDI is capped, including pharmaceuticals, health care and construction. And it is constantly embroiled in disputes with foreign firms. In March, for example, an international arbitration panel ordered Newmont Mining, of America, and Sumitomo, of Japan, to sell some of their shares in a big copper-and-gold mine on Sumbawa island. And in June it banned imports of some models of BlackBerry smartphones, made by Canada’s Research In Motion.

A deep-rooted habit <<>

EVEN before passing through immigration into Indonesia, you may fall prey to the venal flair of its bureaucrats. Most of its embassies now refuse cash payments for visas, after a number of scandals. One ambassador in Malaysia, a former police chief, allegedly pocketed about 2 billion rupiah from unauthorised visa surcharges. But many visitors can now get visas on arrival, payable in cash. To close this tempting window, Ngurah Rai airport in Bali last October introduced an electronic visa-issuing system. By May this year officials at the airport had used it to steal an estimated 3 billion rupiah. Their ruse, to issue 30-day visas, which cost $25, but book them as seven-day ones at $10, was simple and, until spotted, lucrative. The story is typical of Indonesian officialdom’s greed, but also of the increasing efforts to thwart the corrupt.

Acacia avenue <<>

AS A spectacle, the four-hour drive to Teluk Binjai from Pekanbaru, capital of Riau province on the island of Sumatra, tends to the monochrome. Mile after mile of palm-oil plantation alternates with mile after mile of regimented lines of acacia trees, grown for pulpwood. Only an occasional banana grove or superannuated rubber plantation offers a spot of variety. Mountainously laden timber lorries ply the interprovincial highway, their loads of acacia logs almost brushing as they pass. In one direction is the mill of Indah Kiat Pulp and Paper, a subsidiary of APP, part of the Sinar Mas group; in the other that of APRIL, Sumatra’s other big pulp-and-paper producer.

Everybody's friend <<>

IN MOST other respects this is a golden age for Indonesian diplomacy. Its relations with its neighbours are sometimes prickly, especially with Malaysia, with which it squabbles over everything from maritime boundaries to the treatment of migrant workers. And there will always be some resentment of Singapore, a regional haven for the wealthy and, at times, a bolthole for fugitives from Indonesian justice. But these two are also partners with Indonesia in the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN), so they are among its closest allies. In general Indonesia is on good terms with all countries.