Rupiah vs paket kebijakan

Koran SINDO (link)

Rabu,  28 Agustus 2013  −  09:13 WIB

Nilai tukar rupiah terhadap dolar dalam dua minggu ini mengalami penurunan signifikan hingga sempat menembus Rp11.000 per USD1. Sejak awal tahun, rupiah sudah kehilangan nilai tukar hingga lebih dari 10%.

Juga terjadi arus keluar dana investor asing yang keluar dari Bursa Efek Indonesia senilai Rp7,8 triliun. Banyak pengusaha dan media menyikapi fenomena ini secara intens dengan kekhawatiran terjadinya krisis moneter seperti tahun 1998, di mana nilai rupiah sempat menyentuh 17.000 dan capital outflow secara masif yang mengakibatkan krisis ekonomi berkepanjangan. Presiden Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, Jumat lalu (23/8), meluncurkan empat paket kebijakan ekonomi untuk merespons penurunan tersebut.

Sebelum mengkaji efektivitas paket kebijakan ekonomi tersebut, mari kita telaah penyebab penurunan rupiah. Pasar valuta asing bekerja dengan prinsip penawaran dan permintaan. Bila lebih banyak pelaku pasar yang menjual rupiah dan membeli dolar dari sebaliknya, nilai tukar rupiah akan menurun. Secara internal, Indonesia terdapat dua penyebab utama. Pertama, defisit neraca berjalan yang pada kuartal II (April– Juni) 2013 mencapai 4,4% jauh tinggi dari kuartal I (Januari– Maret) yang 2,8%.

Meningkatnya defisit neraca berjalan berarti penduduk dan perusahaan di Indonesia lebih banyak membeli dari luar negeri dibandingkan menjual. Sebagian besar transaksi ekspor dan impor menggunakan dolar, sehingga permintaan terhadap dolar meningkat untuk membiayai impor tersebut. Penyebab internal kedua, adalah tingkat inflasi Indonesia. Apabila nilai riil dari rupiah menurun karena inflasi maka nilai tukar rupiah terhadap mata uang asing otomatis juga akan alami depresiasi.

Inflasi pada Juli mencapai 3,29%, sehingga inflasi semester pertama (Januari–Juli) 2013 mencapai 8,61%. Angka tersebut cukup tinggi dibandingkan tingkat inflasi tahun 2011 dan 2012 yang hanya 3,79% dan 4,3%. Tingginya inflasi tahun ini disebabkan karena kenaikan harga BBM yang memiliki dampak multiplier ke komoditi lainnya, khususnya yang memiliki komponen energi dan transportasi yang signifikan.

Kenaikan BBM kali ini berdempetan dengan Ramadan dan Lebaran, di mana terjadi peningkatan permintaan barang dan jasa. Akumulasi kedua faktor ini berakibat pada inflasi yang ekstra tinggi juga. Tingkat inflasi tahun 2005 yang alami kenaikan BBM mencapai 17,11%, namun tidak terjadi capital outflow dan penurunan nilai rupiah yang drastis. Sehingga resep kebijakan yang komprehensif membutuhkan analisis terhadap kondisi regional dan global.

Rapat rutin Dewan Gubernur Bank Sentral Amerika, lebih kerap disebut The Fed, memberikan indikasi akan mengurangi stimulus moneter yang selama ini gencar dilakukan dengan menekan suku bunga dan memborong berbagai instrumen pasar. Masa jabatan Bernanke sebagai pimpinan The Fed akan berakhir pada awal tahun depan dan hingga sekarang belum ditetapkan penggantinya.

Tingginya arus modal ke negara berkembang pada 2011 dan 2012 didorong oleh para pelaku pasar yang mencari tingkat return lebih tinggi, dibandingkan obligasi pemerintah Amerika yang untuk periode tersebut berkisar pada 1%. Laporan biro statistik Amerika pada Agustus juga menunjukkan perbaikan dengan tingkat pengangguran yang berkurang. Ekonomi Eropa juga menunjukkan tanda positif dan bahkan neraca perdagangannya surplus.

Kombinasi berbagai faktor dan tendensi kenaikan suku bunga di tersebut memicu sebagian para pelaku pasar untuk pulang kampung ke Amerika dan Eropa. Maka bukan hanya Indonesia yang alami capital outflow dan penurunan nilai mata uang, melainkan juga India, China, Brasil, dan Turki yang selama ini dikategorikan sebagai emerging market yang selama dua tahun terakhir menjadi favorit destinasi investasi pelaku pasar. Nilai mata uang India bahkan jatuh hingga 17%.

Dengan kondisi dan latar belakang yang dijabarkan, bagaimana resep kebijakan yang efektif untuk minimalisir dampak negatif? Karena penyebab utama dari fluktuasi rupiah adalah dari faktor eksternal dan dampaknya terkena ke banyak negara, perlu koordinasi kebijakan antarnegara khususnya negara yang terkena dampak dengan didukung beberapa negara G-8.

Koordinasi moneter yang sering menjadi referensi adalah Plaza Accord pada 1985, di mana pemerintah Amerika, Jepang, Prancis, Jerman, dan Kanada bergerak bersama dan berhasil menurunkan nilai dolar Amerika terhadap yen (Jepang) dan mark (Jerman). Indonesia bagian dari Chiang Mai Initiative yang merupakan kerja sama Asia untuk perkuat stabilitas nilai tukar dan makro. Pada 2010, Indonesia pernah meminta pinjaman siaga, padahal cadangan devisa saat itu masih USD124,7 miliar.

Fluktuasi yang asalnya short-termmem butuhkan respons kebijakan yang nyata dampaknya pada jangka pendek Salah satu bagian dari paket kebijakan pemerintah adalah mengurangi defisit berjalan. Bila kita telaah neraca berjalan, 24,3% dari impor Indonesia Januari–Juni 2013 adalah minyak dan gas yang meningkat drastis 24,8% dibandingkan tahunlalu. Untukmengetahuiapakah kenaikan BBM mengurangi konsumsi dan impor masih perlu menunggu BPS mengeluarkan data bulan Agustus dan September.

Tentunya perlu dikomplementasikan dengan kebijakan untuk perbaikan transportasi publik dan berpindahnya dari BBM ke energi terbarukan. Adapun hampir sepertiga impor nonmigas (31,6%) berupa mesin dan elektronik yang sebagian besar merupakan bahan modal dan berpotensi mendorong ekspor. Fenomena ini sering disebut investment-induced import, di mana investasi yang disetujui (khususnya 1-2 tahun lalu) sedang membangun pabrik dan membeli mesin dari luar negeri yang pemerintah memberikan fasilitas pembebasan bea masuk.

Jadi apa impor yang bisa dikurangi? Kenaikan bea masuk untuk sektor otomotif yang merupakan 5,78% dari impor harus diwaspadai sehingga tidak hanya substitusi ke tipe low cost green car (LCGC) yang mendapat pembebasan bea masuk. Potensi lain adalah besi-baja yang merupakan produk impor terbesar ketiga dan 7,5% dari total di mana Krakatau Steel telah menjalin kerja sama dengan Japan Steel dan Posco Steel dari Korea Selatan.

Kebijakan lain untuk mengurangi inflasi adalah menjaga pertumbuhan ekonomi dan permudah investasi bersifat jangka menengah. Namun, perlu waktu untuk merasakan dampak kebijakan ini, sehingga tak heran pelaku pasar tidak merespons secara positif dan nilai rupiah serta IHSG tidak meningkat.

Supaya kredibilitaskebijakan meningkat. Pemerintah perlu segera memberikan detail dari insentif dan kebijakan dalam paket tersebut, sehingga dapat dianalisis secara mendalam dan tidak berkesan sekadar pencitraan. Kementerian Keuangan dan Bank Indonesia pada khususnya perlu bekerja ekstrakeras untuk menjaga stabilitas rupiah dan pertumbuhan ekonomi di tahun politik.

BERLY MARTAWARDAYA
Dosen FEUI dan Ekonom Indef

Toward fair competition, an end to political dynasty

Berly Martawardaya, Jakarta | Opinion | Mon, March 25 2013, 11:28 AM

Jakarta Post | Page: 6 - Original link

In the movie Spider-man, there is a stage in Peter Parker’s life where he earns money as a professional wrestler. Using his superpowers, he wins fights against many different types of opponents. Later, Parker realizes that it is not fair for someone with superhuman powers to fight head-to-head against an average person.

There has been a recent renewal of public interest in political dynasties. The 26-year-old regent of Bangkalan, Makmun Ibnu Fuad, is continuing his father’s reign. The mayor of Cimahi was elected to continue her husband’s term of office. 

Banten is a prominent example of a family having a strong presence in politics. Governor Ratu Atut Chosiyah’s sister, Ratu Tatu Chasanah, is the deputy regent of Serang, her stepbrother,Tb Haerul Jaman, is the mayor of Serang and her sister in-law, Airin Rachmi Diany, is the regent of South Tangerang. Numerous Banten councilors are also Atut’s blood relatives.

General director of Regional Autonomy Djohermansyah said that there were 57 local chief executives elected to continue the offices of blood relatives. Concerns about political dynasties has prompted the government to a submit revision of Law 32/2004 on local elections, which would prohibit direct blood relative of local chief executives running in an immediate local election to succeed the incumbent. 

Home Minister Gamawan Fauzi said the prohibition includes vertical relationships such as a father and child as well as horizontal blood relationships such as brother and sister.

Opponents of the policy say that the prohibition would go against human rights and equality before the law. They vow to challenge the bill at the Constitutional Court (MK), if it is passed into law. 

The fight against the excessive accumulation of power and the promotion of fair competition within a clear legal framework was the essence of the 1998 reformation. Among the reformation’s legacy is decentralization, which reduces the central government’s political power, presidential term limitations and the formation of the Commission for the Supervision of Business Competition (KPPU), which the curbs the excessive accumulation of economic power.

However, there is no commission that ensures fair political competition. Drawing from Aristotle’s distributive justice, there is an idea about treating equals equally and unequal’s unequally (Nicomachean Ethics, Book V, Chapter VI). 

During the New Order, there was a joke going around that the most important qualification for a president was having experience as a president. Since the only person with presidential experience was president Soeharto, he was re-elected without being challenged. The constitutional amendment after Soeharto’s downfall that limits presidential terms to a maximum of two is an acknowledgement that the right to run for office is not absolute. 

The term limit ensures the rise of new voices and fresh approaches at least once a decade. It also applies Aristotle’s concept that a two-term president would not compete on equal terms with any other person, thus needs to be treated unequally by being prohibited from running for a third term. 

The public and legal community has agreed on the validity of prohibiting the chief executive from a third term. The question is: Would prohibiting the candidacy of direct relatives be justifiable?

Having an incumbent’s direct relative as a candidate would also deter a highly qualified and competent person who is a nonrelative from running for the same office. Empirical data shows that regions with lower social mobility at top executive positions tend to display lower human development and governance quality.

In his study entitled “Populism, Dynasty and Consolidation of Parties”, Marcus Mietzener implies that Indonesia is still a society with a scent of feudalism at the democracy consolidation stage. Many shadows of Indonesia’s past looms close enough to pull it back from becoming a mature democracy that is able to provide welfare for its people. 

There is also a strong argument toward extending prohibition to nieces and cousins as in the traditional kingdom; they got full family support to become successors in the case that a child or brother did not display adequate leadership and competence.

Indonesia also faces the problem of the politicization of civil service. Formally, the civil service is neutral in elections. But there have been many instances where the re-election of an incumbent executive benefitted from the support of civil servants. 

When an incumbent’s relative runs for office, he or she would benefit from the incumbency by hook, respect and a speck of feudalism, or by crook, a blatant directive to support, without any additional scrutiny toward an incumbent. 

If we look abroad, there are political dynasties in many countries. In the US, there is the Bush family from which the father and son both served as president, in the Philippines there is the Macapagal family from which the father and daughter both served as president and in Singapore there is the Lee family from which both the father and son served as prime minister. There is one similarity between all the above mentioned pairs, which is that they were all not elected consecutively. There was at least one nonrelated person who served as chief executive between the father and child’s term. 

However, we should be careful in casting the net too wide. Prohibition should not be more than one term. If a majority of the people elects a blood relative after five years without the benefit of incumbency, then that is a display of real support that should be respected. Expanding prohibition between different levels and branches of the government would be too much too soon. We should take one step then observe the impact. 

Indonesia still has to address the problems of poverty, equality and service provision. The Regional Autonomy Law puts responsibility on the back of regents and mayors. Therefore, it is imperative that the regional head is a capable person and is elected on their merits, not on ascribe status and family relationships. As the Prophet Muhammad said, a country that does not put its most capable people in governing positions is waiting for its own destruction. 

Law No. 5/1999 on antimonopoly states that economic freedom and competition has its limits. It would be prudent to put some well-thought legal limit on political competition in the revision of Law 32/2004 on local government. As Peter Parker’s uncle would have said, “With great power, comes great responsibility” to regulate it. 

The writer is lecture in planning and public policy at the University of Indonesia, senior economist at INDEF and deputy chairman of the Nahdlatul Ulama Scholar Association (ISNU).

A year of respect for Indonesian women

Berly Martawardaya, Jakarta | Opinion | Fri, February 22 2013, 10:23 AM

Paper Edition | Page: 7. Jakarta Post (Original link)

Let us start with two recent cases of disrespect toward women. First, Garut Regent Aceng Fikri took a 17-year-old girl as his second wife in an unregistered marriage (siri) only to divorce her by SMS four days later, claiming she was not a virgin. He locked her in his home for days after the wedding day.

Second, judge Muhammad Daming Sunusi, the head of the Banjarmasin High Court, told House of Representatives’ members who grilled him during a selection of Supreme Court justices that “both the victim of rape and the rapist might have enjoyed their intercourse together, so we should think twice before handing down the death penalty”.

Deanna Ramsay (The Jakarta Post, Feb. 14) said the two cases marked a bad start to the year for women. I beg to differ.

To assess respect for women in current contestation of public policy discourse, we need to look back at the history of Indonesia, where women have often played a significant role.

Kartini’s intellectual awakening and the social change she ushered in by promoting formal education for women back in the 19th century led many to continue her deeds. On the war front, Aceh’s Cut Nyak Dien’s ferocious fight against the Dutch was an inspiration in the pre-independence movement.

The two names were prominent examples of the many heroines who have shed blood, sweat and tears for a free Indonesia.

Among the cultural royalty, including religious clerics, military leaders and educated professionals that made up 68 Indonesian members of the Preparatory Body for Indonesian Independence (BPUPKI), there were two female members: Siti Mangunpuspito who headed the women’s division at the Jakarta Office of Java Hokokai and Maria Ulfah, who was later appointed social services minister (1946-1947).

A historian and political scientist expressed surprise when he discovered the issue of women voting rights was unanimously passed without any prolonged debate back in 1945 despite strong patriarchic tendencies in many of Indonesia’s ethnic groups.

Founding president Sukarno appointed three more female ministers during his reign, who were SK Trimurti as manpower minister (1947-1948), Rusiah Sardjono as social services minister (1962-1966) and Artati M Sudirdjo as basic education and culture minister (1964-1966).

Such a journey was not as smooth in other countries. Unlike Indonesia, the US took 157 years after independence to install a female minister, when Frances Perkins was appointed secretary of labor under the progressive presidency of Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1933. Women in the US then had to wait for another 44 years until two more women, Juanita M Krepps and Patricia R Harris, were appointed ministers during the Jimmy Carter presidency in 1977-1981.

Historically, the 56 delegates of the second Continental Congress that signed the US Declaration of Independence in 1776 were all white males and it took the Americans 144 years to grant voting rights to women in 1920. Even after 1945, seven state legislatures had yet to affirm the equal right, with Mississippi
being the last in 1984.

While its fair to argue that a progressive movement in the 20th century affected many countries in the world simultaneously, it is hard to state that respect for women in Indonesia was not an ingrained part of the independence movement here and, at least partially, was hardwired to national institutions and conventions. Nevertheless, we have to admit that the women’s movement in Indonesia has had its ups and downs along the way.

Islam, the religion of the majority of Indonesians, has sometimes been misused as justification for disrespectful acts against women. Many deliberately ignore numerous instances where the Koran and Hadiths clearly hold women in high regard. One of the latter being that the best Muslim men are those who treat women and wives the best (Hadith by Tirmidzi: 285).

Sometimes in public policy, the public backlash is more important and lasts longer than the act itself. In the cases of Aceng and Daming, the reaction was quick and harsh. Aceng faces imminent impeachment upon request of the Regional Legislative Council (DPRD), while Daming has to bury his dream of wearing a Supreme Court robe after receiving a “no” vote in the House.

In both cases, the offenders fell from grace in five nasty and brutish stages.

First, unflattering comments, jokes and photo-shopped images spread like wildfire through BlackBerry messenger groups, Twitter and other social media outlets.

Second, print and electronic media highlighted their misdeeds.

Third, prominent women activists and NGOs concerned for women turned up the volume of protest.

Fourth, leaders of state institutions with built-in tendencies to protect women such as the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM), the National Commission on Violence Against Women (Komnas Perempuan) and the Women’s Empowerment and Child Protection Ministry, all shared their concern and condemnation.

Fifth, a very public brouhaha convinced state and political party figures to deal the two men a deadly blow.

The boycotting power of women was also evident in the cases of Puspo Wardoyo, owner of Wong Solo restaurant chain and Muslim cleric Abdullah Gymnastiar who both practice polygamy.

Indeed, the rising power of women has a positive impact on politics. Any ambitious Indonesian should avoid disrespecting women in words and deeds.

However, the trend will be more beneficial for Indonesia if the wrath of women is also turned toward dealing with corruption, poverty and environmental degradation that inflict damage on the country and its people in the long run.

In her lyrics, American singer Aretha Franklin says women deserve just a little bit of respect. In Indonesia, 2013 is a year of increasing political respect for women and will pave the way for even better years ahead.

The writer, a lecturer in planning and public policy at the University of Indonesia is deputy chairman of the Nahdlatul Ulama Scholar Association (ISNU).