Indonesia’s president, Joko Widodo, has shown a lack of leadership in the fight against COVID-19, according to the author of a book on the former furniture maker who took office six years ago.

Ben Bland talks to Keith Richburg.

Indonesia currently ranks 23rd of 217 countries in terms of the number of infections and deaths from coronavirus, with more than 250,000 infected and almost 10,000 dead at the time of writing.

Widodo, once considered the embodiment of hope and change, has shown himself in office to be a consummate pragmatist. But he is now being tested by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Benjamin Bland said that while many countries were experiencing second and third waves, Indonesia was similar to the United States in that it still in ‘an endless first wave’.

The author of Man of Contradictions: Joko Widodo and the Struggle to Remake Indonesia, described the effect on the country as ‘extremely concerning’, adding that the ‘majority of the workforce is employed informally’ – motorcycle taxi drivers, domestic helpers, for example – professions that cannot work from home. The result was increasing inequality as millions were pushed into poverty. Bland added that ‘very confused messaging’ from the government had aided the spread of COVID-19 and put pressure on a health system already deeply underfunded and stretched.

He said that the virus had increased Indonesia’s reliance on China, with the country now waiting for a vaccine from Beijing. Indonesia was already enjoying Chinese funding for various infrastructure projects, Bland said. On its relationship with China, Bland said Indonesia’s desire was to maintain strategic autonomy in the region ‘and keep out of trouble as much as possible’ which frustrates neighbouring Australia and Washington who see the country as potentially a ‘third force’ in Asia, pushing back against China.

In a wide ranging talk, he also touched on the threat of climate change to Indonesia. Its capital city, Jakarta, has sunk 2.5 metres in the last decade. Home to 10 million people, almost half the swampy city is below sea level. Widodo was, pre-COVID, instrumental in a plan to move the capital to Kalimantan on the island of Borneo. The plan is currently on hold.

On Widodo himself, Bland said the book had been difficult to write as he struggled to ‘get a handle on exactly what kind of leader he is’. Having only been in politics for nine years, and in power for six, Widodo has been given many labels – reformer, liberal, pragmatist, technocrat – with something in almost all.

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Plans for a large, looming hospital to be built on historic Bishop Hill, adjacent to the FCC, have been curtailed after the Town Planning Board officially supported height restrictions.

Plans for a new 25-storey hospital proposed by the Sheng Kung Hui (Anglican church) – occupants of the site since the 1840s – had prompted significant objections from those in the neighbouring area. In February, the Town Planning Board imposed an 80 metres height restriction on any newly-built structure on the northern part of the site. Then, in early September, the Town Planning Commission officially confirmed these height restrictions, which ensures that the historic atmosphere of Bishop Hill will not be overwhelmed by new developments.

Campaigner and FCC member, John Batten, said: “This is a good decision for Hong Kong. The Anglican Church should now take a good look at the wonderful history of Bishop Hill and give up any judicial review that it is considering to challenge the Town Planning Board’s decision.”

The United States and China could enjoy greater cooperation if Joe Biden wins the Presidential Election in November, Nobel prize winner Joseph Stiglitz told an FCC webinar.

Joseph Stiglitz talks to Club President Jodi Schneider on September 15, 2020.

He said the possibility of decoupling between the two nations depended on the results of the election, adding that there were ‘very strong strands in the United States that are very concerned’ about China’s human rights record and believe America should express its views on the matter.

Stiglitz, who was awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics in 2001, said the Trump administration had moved the relationship between China and the U.S. into issues of ‘second-rate importance, away from issues of real importance’.

“I hope we can cooperate, because we can cooperate if there is a restoration of democracy to Hong Kong, there’s respect for human rights, the Uyghurs… if there’s a movement away from the surveillance state… there’s lots of room for cooperation. But I worry about whether we’ll achieve that,” said Stiglitz.

On Hong Kong, Stiglitz – a professor at Columbia University – warned of the ‘profound effect’ the national security law would have on China’s relationship with the West.

The ‘ambiguity’ of the law itself is already making people ‘nervous’ about going to China, he said.

“I’m not very optimistic about Hong Kong. I think that the national security law is going to have big reverberations for all of China. I know a lot of people who are now nervous about going to China because they’ve been outspoken about democracy, about Hong Kong, about human rights and they worry ‘will they be entrapped by the new law?’” he added.

Stiglitz, author of several acclaimed books on economic policy, said Hong Kong is not being forgotten by the rest of the world, adding: “I think what is happening to Hong Kong is going to have a profound effect on the relationship between China and the West.”

Turning to the coronavirus pandemic, Stiglitz, author of People Power, and Profits: Progressive Capitalism for an Age of Discontent, said America’s handling of COVID-19 was ‘an utter disaster’ because the ‘pre-existing conditions were already bad’. He cited lower life expectancy under Trump, a lack of hospital beds and vital protective equipment, and the defunding of the Center for Disease Control as pre-existing conditions.

He said Trump’s ‘vaccine nativism’ was an ‘ugly aspect’ of the aftermath of the pandemic, which he said could only be solved by global solidarity, not by attempting to hoard a vaccine.

Stiglitz said Trump’s ‘America first’ stance had made it increasingly difficult for the United States to cooperate with other countries. He added that Trump ‘seems to have a love affair with every authoritarian figure in the world’.

“This is a global issue of the democracies of the world – Europe, the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand – versus authoritarian governments. It’s not a battle over the ideologies in the way that it was communism versus capitalism – it’s really a very simple battle between democracy and authoritarian respect for human rights,” he said.

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