Page 90 - Demo

Islam, Democracy and Human Rights in Contemporary Indonesia73In response to the dissolution of RIS, Natsir arrived with hiswell-known %u201cmosi integral%u201d (integral motion). According to him,the federal government had to hold three-way negotiationsbetween the members of RIS to fuse their states into one unitarystate of %u201cthe Republic of Indonesia%u201d. This %u201cfusion%u201d resulted in thedissolution of the federal states and the creation of the Republicof Indonesia. The term %u201cthe Republic of Indonesia%u201d was utilizedto put to one side the psychological burdens of its leaders, whohad experienced the political situation of RIS. The motion gainedsupport from the majority of parliamentary members and wasimplemented by the federal government of RIS. Finally, it waspossible to establish a unitary state of the Republic of Indonesia on17 August 1950. To emphasize the significance of the motion, Natsirmade several political approaches to all factions, including thecommunists. Finally, the dissolution of RIS could be conductedpeacefully without any bloodshed.In this new unitary republic, whose territory covered as largean area as the present day%u2019s, minus Irian Jaya and East Timor,Natsir was appointed by Soekarno to form a cabinet for theRepublic of Indonesia. His appointment may have been relatedto his integral motion, but it may also have been connectedwith Natsir%u2019s position as the head of the Masyumi faction, whichconstituted the biggest faction in the Temporary Parliament ofthe Republic of Indonesia. In the formation of the cabinet, Natsirattempted to create a coalition with the second biggest factionin the parliament, Partai National Indonesia (PNI %u2014TheIndonesian Nationalist Party), but this failed. Finally, heestablished a %u2018zaken cabinet%u2019 with a flexible calculation of themajority of support going to the ministers in the cabinet. Thepragmatic and flexible characteristics of the Natsir cabinet were