Gamari Sutrisno and the Misconception about Legislative Members

"The hard thing that we need to clarify is public opinion and it is not an easy thing"

Mon, 1 July, 2013
Andira and Dika

JAKARTA - Before we came and had a chance to talk with this legislative member, both of us already had a bad perception about those people who have a job there. We thought that legislative members have a thick connection with term corruption like what often being portrait in media. We also think that they have taken the citizen’s money for their own benefits. But after we met him, it turned out to be the opposite.

Friendly and religious, those are our first impressions when we met this man. His name is Mr. Gamari Sutrisno and he is a part of Komisi II in Indonesian House of Representatives. This 62 years old man belongs to Partai Keadilan Sejahtera (PKS).  His background was from communication, where he studied and worked in AKPEN (Akademi Penerangan). Because he has the same background with us then we found it easier and interesting to discuss our contrast perception with him.

Our conversation with him began with how he became a legislative member which started after he retired from Menkopolkam  (Menteri Koordinator Bidang Politik dan Keamanan). He explained that after his retirement, he often attended studies that conducted by state and private agencies and also became a lecturer in several universities.

“While attending these studies, I met many people, including the mentors who came from PKS. I attended these studies for about two years and after that, I was being offered to be legislative member from PKS.  I agreed on this since PKS has the same vision and mission like me, which is dakwah. Long story, I was elected to be the official legislative member for Daerah Pemilihan III, Central Java that includes cities like Blora, Pati, Rembang, and Grobogan.” He continued his explanation.

He also explained the 3 main jobs of House of Representative to us.  The first job is to make legislation that related with their (Komisi II) partners, such as Ministry of Home Affairs, Ministry of the State Secretariat, Government Administration Agency, and 6 others agencies. The second job is to supervise the government in doing their regulations to know if they keep going in the right track. They also supervise the budget that being used by them. The last main job is to discuss the budget that being proposed from the government to House of Representatives.  Surprisingly, without we had a chance to talk to him about this, he took initiative to clarify people’s misunderstandings regarding his job.

“This is what often being misunderstood by public. They think that House of Representatives are the one who hold the budget and we are the one who corrupted. But the truth is the budget is not on us. Our budget is only involved in giving the legislative members’ salary. If there is a corruption caused by legislative member, then it might be because they have connection with private agency. And if we find any violation acts, we will call the Minister or the party that involved in this case in order reminding them about their actual job.”

Furthermore, we tried to ask him about PKS’ ex-president imported meats corruption issue. At first, he said that he did not want to discuss about that. But, he explained his point of view regarding that issue.

            

           ” I’d rather not say about that matter. But, I need to explain that personal case has to be separated from party related cases. Right now, it is a personal case. The truth is, PKS as an institution/party does not have any incidents because the party does not contribute to any corruption. Only being implied so by the media and some other groups because it is the president who is in this issue that is why people think that it is identical with PKS itself. So far, PKS itself is pretty solid, meaning that we could tell the differences between personal matters over party issues. The hard thing that we need to clarify is public opinion and it is not an easy thing.”  

This man, who used to be mentored by Indonesia current president, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, told us that it is important to shape another opinion as a diversion when public opinion has been constructed.

“If you keep quiet, it stands for agreement, but if you speak up, it will be considered as a denial. But in every action there is a risk. That is why, if you pay much attention to media, PKS stands against this issue. If someone were making a personal opinion over something, it has to be questioned. One opinion should meet with another. If we stay quiet over this, people would think that our personal issues are party issues.”

       

             That is the end of our conversation with Mr. Gamari Sutrisno. To be honest, this interview open up our new perceptions toward legislative members since we often associated them with bad things, especially corruption. We also learned not to be over generalized everything. Just because one individual does something wrong, does not mean all of the individuals in the community are all the same. This is like what happened between Mr. Gamari and PKS. Even though PKS is involved with corruption case, Mr. Gamari is not affected by that. Because of this thing, we conclude that Mr. Gamari Sutrisno is one of the good legislative members.

                                                                                                                                Andira & Dika,

Communication Binus International 2015