Psychiatric help on hand for losers in Indonesia elections
Updated
With just over a week to go before Indonesia votes in parliamentary elections an Indonesian psychiatric clinic is preparing to treat some of those politicians who are unlucky enough to lose at the ballot box. National campaigns cost millions of dollars. The pressure to win is huge. And as some have found in the past the stress can be too much.
Presenter: Liam Cochrane
Speaker: Dr Erwin Kusuma, psychiatrist, Jakarta; Damien Kingsbury, associate professor, Deakin University, Melbourne
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COCHRANE: After Indonesia's last election in 2004 the Ghrasia Mental Hospital in Yogyakarta found itself with two patients who were - to quote the hospital director - 'very stressed' about losing.
So this year, with 12,000 candidates battling for just 600 parliamentary seats, the hospital is getting prepared.
They've assigned ten rooms for VVIPs, or Very Very Important People.
Erwin Kusuma is an Indonesian psychiatrist.
He says the main danger is the gap between 12,000 lofty ambitions and the hard fact that there can be only 600 winners.
KUSUMA: The reality is not like what they hope, so they will be frustrated.
COCHRANE: Dr Kusuma says preventing mental problems is better than trying to cure them later.
He suggests that in the future there should be medical checks of all candidates, including a psychiatric assessment, before the campaign begins.
It's not clear exactly what mental ailments the losing candidates might suffer from, but Dr Kusuma says a total breakdown is possible.
KUSUMA: There are cases of frustration and they become psychotic.
COCHRANE: And what happens, when you say become 'psychotic' what does that mean, are they angry or are they confused? What does that mean, 'psychotic'?
KUSUMA: Psychotic is out of mind, in lay term, crazy.
COCHRANE: At least part of the pressure is financial.
Damien Kingsbury is associate professor at the School of International and Political Studies at Australia's Deakin University.
He says candidates rely on massive financial input from backers who want to have a friendly face in parliament.
KINGSBURY: In terms of money that you need to run a successful campaign, it's certainly in the tens, if not, hundreds of millions of dollars. But it devolves to things like, not just running the campaign, doing the advertising and all of the usual sorts of things that you would spend money on, but also doing things like staging rallies, buying t-shirts for people, and I mean thousands, literally thousands of t-shirts, and indeed in many cases, actually handing out small amounts of cash to supporters.
COCHRANE: The costs for a national election might be huge but so are the potential rewards for those in office.
KINGSBURY: There's no question that successful political candidates are offered lucrative offerings and shares in companies and so on, so there are advantages, but formally, one should not be able to engage in the types of practices that characterise Indonesia under the new order.
COCHRANE: The large number of candidates this time is also dotted with about 50 celebrities, something of a new phenomenon in Indonesian politics.
One candidate, Rachel Maryam Sayidina, recently interrupted the filming of a TV show to give a media interview, still wearing her costume of a shiny pink mermaid tail.
She admitted that most people were more interested in taking a souvenir photo with her, rather than in her vision for the country's future.
The rush of celebrities is because of new electoral rules, which give victory to whoever gets the most votes, a change from previous elections when winning parties selected their candidates.
Some have questioned whether these high profile celebrities will be able to do the job if they win. But Damien Kingsbury says showmanship has always been part of the political game.
KINGSBURY: Well, on one hand one could argue that this is a trivialisation of politics, but in Indonesia and indeed in a number of South East Asian countries, having a high public profile regardless of the source of that is always a political advantage.
COCHRANE: But don't bet on the mermaid just yet. Associate professor Damien Kingsbury says it's the professional politicians who will come to the surface once the votes are counted.
KINGSBURY: The polls are indicated that it's the serious politicians who are leading in the polls - that being the current president, the incumbent Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and his main rival, Megawati Sukarnoputri, the former president. So, they are, regardless of whatever you might say about them as candidates, they are serious politicians, they are professional politicians, and they are the ones who are leading the race.
