Prabowo derided outsiders but he doesn’t mind Australians

Jakarta: For all his thundering about unnamed foreign villains and meddlers, Prabowo Subianto at least seems to have a soft spot for Australia.

The defence minister and former special forces commander, who declared victory and is on track to be Indonesia’s next president, reminded the 2022 Shangri-La dialogue in Singapore of “Australian labour unions striking for our independence”.

Indonesian Defence Minister Prabowo Subianto with his Australian counterpart, Richard Marles, during their meeting in Jakarta in June.Credit: AP

“We remember Australian workers refusing to handle Dutch cargo,” he said, concluding a story of Nelson Mandela and the importance of remembering your friends.

The reference was to Australian wharfies’ 1945 embargo of the “black armada” of Dutch ships trying to sail for Indonesia, which had recently asserted its independence. The Dutch of the day, however, considered it their colonial possession and were attempting to reassert control amid the shambles of World War II.

Workers spoiled the plans of more than 500 Dutch crews across multiple cities, making it one of Australia’s biggest ever boycotts. Indonesia’s first prime minister, Sutan Syahrir, thanked Australians in a 1945 radio address.

Australia’s relationship with its giant near neighbour has had its share of downers since 1945, but it is important and presently good.

We have a free trade deal and a comprehensive strategic partnership. Defence Minister Richard Marles met with his counterpart Prabowo in November last year to continue work on a defence co-operation agreement supposed to facilitate sharing of information and technology.

But there are concerns among some Indonesia watchers about what a Prabowo presidency might mean for Indonesian democracy and its relationship with the region. The party he founded, Gerindra, for example, has a platform of returning to the 1945 constitution, which would consolidate more power in the palace and do away with direct presidential elections.

He has personally been accused of historical human rights abuses, a claim credible enough for successive US administrations to ban him from entering.

In the 2023 Shangri-La dialogue, Prabowo went off script to propose Russia-friendly solutions to the war in Ukraine, which were widely derided.

He has presented variously in his three elections tilts as a fire breathing nationalist, an impassioned Islamist and finally an “adorable” grandpa.

When current President Joko Widodo’s constitutional limit expires in October, could Prabowo, free of the electoral imperatives that have led him to try on multiple personas, throw everything out the window to be his own man?

“I highly doubt it, to be honest with you,” Indonesian-born Griffiths University professor Dian Tjondronegoro says.

He notes how Prabowo successfully campaigned on continuing Joko’s popular policies, consolidating this in the minds of voters by selecting the incumbent’s 36-year-old son, Gibran Rakabuming Raka, as his vice presidential running mate.

“He is pricklier and more brittle than Jokowi ... the interpersonal aspects of dealing with Prabowo will be important for Australian leaders.”

Professor Justin Hastings, The University of Sydney

So central is Jokowi, as Joko is widely known, in the minds of ordinary Indonesians, they chanted his name after mentions in Prabowo’s victory speech on Wednesday.

“Prabowo’s record is chequered,” Ben Bland, the director of the Asia-Pacific Program at think tank Chatham House, writes in Foreign Affairs.

“Yet the most dire narratives from abroad about a possible Prabowo presidency say as much about Western anxieties as they do about Indonesia.

“Indonesian voters’ enthusiasm for Prabowo does not represent a disillusionment with democracy; instead, it reflects their conviction that he will uphold Jokowi’s positive economic legacy – and their implicit faith that their democratic institutions can rein in even a strong-willed president.”

Prabowo speaks of an “Asian way” of diplomacy in which everyone gets along through co-operation and talking, but who generally leave each other alone.

As such, he “respects” Australia’s AUKUS and Quad partnerships where other Indo-Pacific leaders haven’t.

“It is not Indonesia’s duty or Indonesia’s right to have an opinion on the opinions of those respective countries,” Prabowo said in the 2022 dialogue.

“We do not believe in, let us say, alliances that could, in the end, threaten other countries. But that is our opinion.”

Prabowo Subianto thanks supporters after Wednesday’s national elections.Credit: Oscar Siagian

Professor Justin Hastings from the University of Sydney says Prabowo’s commitment to continuity from Jokowi and the coalition of interests he had amassed to win the presidency would make it hard to veer unexpectedly away from the country’s geopolitical trajectory.

This is good for Australia.

“Indonesia has a huge consumption-happy middle class, and the Indonesian economy is generally growing, and presents a potentially huge trading partner for Australia,” Hastings says.

“While Indonesia’s overall foreign policy is unlikely to change, including its relations with Australia, he is pricklier and more brittle than Jokowi, so we can imagine that the interpersonal aspects of dealing with Prabowo will become important for Australian leaders.”

Prabowo’s bluster about foreign nations dividing Indonesians is designed for local audiences and has played well. On the global stage, he has appeared as a statesman, even if at times over-enthusiastically. But he is no fool.

The Australian-Indonesian relationship, though destined for unexpected rough seas from time to time, will endure.

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