Page 114 - Demo

Islam, Democracy and Human Rights in Contemporary Indonesia97change a democratic system through a veiled dictatorship inthe form of a democracy %u201cthat suits the state of mind andpersonality of the nation%u201d. Guided Democracy or EasternDemocracy, which was introduced by Soekarno in 1957 andwhich centres power in the hands of the president, is only a%u201cdictatorship in the guise of democracy%u201d.In response to the introduction of Guided Democracy, beforewhich Soekarno wanted to %u201cbury the parties in Indonesia%u201d,Natsir wrote two articles entitled %u201cYang Akan Berdiri di atasKuburan Partai-Partai adalah Diktatur%u201d (What Will Stand onthe Parties%u2019 Graves is Dictatorship) and %u201cKemampuanMengendalikan Diri [adalah] Syarat Mutlak bagiKemerdekaan%u201d (The Ability of Self-restrain [is] an EssentialRequirement for Independence). In these articles, Natsir againemphasized the demand for the preservation of %u201csound valuesof life%u201d in running political lives.Democracy, he said, was not merely a tool, but a foundationfor collective life; it could not be replaced by dictatorship, which%u201cobviously was a system in contradiction to Islamic principles%u201d.He regarded the Indonesian political difficulties in the late 1950sas not lying within the democratic system, but rather in thefact that politicians had lost their idealism: the blurring of theboundary between the decent and the indecent,and of %u201dzakelijk and objectief%u201d (firm and objective) values. In thissituation, Natsir warned Muslims that Islam taught that %u201cinconducting political, social and statehood lives, one is not allowedto detach ethical and moral values, which were not to be boughtand sold or made fools of%u201d. In other words, he said, %u201cengagingin politics was not to be detached from religious teachings,which were the source of life values and moral standards%u201d.