From My Point of View

I wrote several months ago, that most people in Indonesia do not look forward enthusiastically toward the election, next July. I assumed that the reason for this widespread apathy is the old faces'candidates offered to the public. Most of the contestants competing in this election are from old times, with old promises. People --understandably-- are tired. But then, as the campaign geared up to its final days, I sense a different mood amongst the people. People are starting to pay attention. Gossips spread around the corner, about this candidate and that candidate. On my way to work, people on the train, in foodstalls just across the station, on buses, anywhere, started to compare their judgment about what our future will be, if this candidate or that candidate, win the election. More and more people start to register themselves as voters. In the last legislative election, many people were not eligible to vote because they failed to register themselves in advance at the village/sub-...

Riyadi Suparno , The Jakarta Post , Paris | Fri, 03/20/2009 1:10 PM | Headlines After sinking deep during the financial crisis, Indonesia has now entered the club of the world's fastest growing economies, but it needs further economic reforms and liberalization to gain more from international trade. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), in its latest report "Globalization and Emerging Economies" released in Geneva on Thursday, includes Indonesia among the world's best performing large developing economies. Indonesia now sits alongside Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, in a group the OECD calls BRIICS. "The inclusion of Indonesia into BRIICS is a recognition of the importance and size of the country, the situation relative to OECD member countries, and the desire of OECD countries to engage in it more closely," Douglas Lippoldt, acting head of the Development Division at the Trade and Agricultural Directorate of...