There are many other critical issues currently faced by this nation. While relatively peaceful, the recent general parliamentary and presidential elections left a number of unanswered questions, such as the questions about eligible yet unregistered voters, ‘phantom voters,’ vote-buying, limited women representation and the like. Despite a number of good local practices, decentralization has generally not translated into significantly better services to the people.
Starting off 2009, the Partnership has been striving to implement various activities relevant to today’s pressing governance agenda. We have been working to ensure the successful conducting of the 2009 elections, putting considerable efforts into mitigating the impacts of climate change and continuing with mainstreaming anticorruption in public services. A significant initiative that is being undertaken involves the identification, dissemination and replication of best practices in the education and health sectors. The ultimate goal of this effort is to help improve public services at the local-government level through the dissemination and replication of best practices among local governments.
It has been a rewarding year for the Partnership. We have made a significant contribution to governance reform in Indonesia and raised our profile by participating in a number of anti-corruption forums.
In the course of the year, we have helped the General Election Commission, or KPU, develop election regulation, monitoring and evaluation procedures; assisted the General Election Supervisory Board (Bawaslu) with its strategic plan and ensured public participation in the selection of state commissions (KPK, KY, the Ombudsman Commission, Kompolnas and LPSK). The Partnership also helped draft the Anti-Corruption Court Law, the Draft Law on Asset Recovery, and successfully advocated for increased female representation in goverment.
As the special agreement between the Partnership, BAPPENAS
and the UNDP concludes at the end of this year and we move
towards full independence from the UNDP, we are busy wrapping
up our programming activities and all their associated
reports and accounts. Most of our programs conclude at the
end of this year and we are moving at full speed to meet our
targets. Steps have also been taken to ensure we comply with
the UNDP project closure requirements.
The year 2008 is a highly symbolic year in the life of our nation, it’s a year that marks 10 years of reform, 80 years since the Youth Pledge and 100 years of National Awakening. The Partnership wanted to commemorate this date in a way that would also promote and enhance its standing in Indonesia’s social, political, and policy discourse, especially around the issues of governance reform. But unlike many other events marking 10 years since Reformasi, the Partnership wanted a commemoration that was a more sober evaluation of the state of the nation. To do this, we organized an expert roundtable on 27 June 2008 attended by prominent scholars and analysts, with the theme of Reform, Democracy and People’s Welfare.
