WEBVTT - Is Indonesia’s 'fresh democracy' under threat? 0:00:02.080 --> 0:00:05.600 From the newsrooms of the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age. 0:00:05.640 --> 0:00:10.280 This is the morning edition. I'm Samantha Selinger Morris. It's Thursday, 0:00:10.480 --> 0:00:18.960 May 15th. In this time of political and economic chaos, 0:00:19.120 --> 0:00:22.720 we arguably need our allies more than ever. So let's 0:00:22.720 --> 0:00:25.919 cut to Tuesday evening, when Prime Minister Anthony Albanese flew 0:00:25.920 --> 0:00:30.880 to Indonesia to meet its president, Prabowo Subianto. It was 0:00:30.880 --> 0:00:35.720 notable Albanese's first overseas trip since being re-elected, but recent 0:00:35.720 --> 0:00:39.320 waves of protest against Subianto have erupted in the country 0:00:39.560 --> 0:00:42.919 amidst fears that the president is taking Indonesia back to 0:00:42.960 --> 0:00:49.879 its authoritarian past. Today, international and political editor Peter Hartcher 0:00:49.920 --> 0:00:53.880 on what sort of ally Anthony Albanese has in Indonesia's 0:00:53.880 --> 0:01:03.960 leader Prabowo Subianto. Okay, Peter. Tell me about the significance 0:01:03.960 --> 0:01:07.080 of Anthony Albanese making a trip to Indonesia yesterday. We 0:01:07.080 --> 0:01:10.320 know this was his first overseas stop after being re-elected 0:01:10.319 --> 0:01:12.880 as prime minister. So is this something that makes the 0:01:12.880 --> 0:01:14.919 ears of leaders around the world prick up? 0:01:15.520 --> 0:01:18.920 Well, in one way, no, because it's the most obvious 0:01:18.920 --> 0:01:20.880 and natural thing in the world to do. And he's 0:01:20.880 --> 0:01:23.680 not the first prime minister to make his first trip 0:01:23.680 --> 0:01:28.840 to Jakarta, because it's really our only strategically significant neighbour. 0:01:29.680 --> 0:01:34.440 It's a mighty country of nearly 300 million people, an 0:01:34.440 --> 0:01:39.640 enormous arc of archipelagic islands that stretch over a couple 0:01:39.680 --> 0:01:43.760 of thousands of kilometres across all our northern approaches. So 0:01:43.800 --> 0:01:47.120 it's it's a hugely important country for us, and it's 0:01:47.120 --> 0:01:50.880 natural that you'd visit your closest and most important neighbour. Sorry. 0:01:50.920 --> 0:01:51.600 New Zealand. 0:01:51.800 --> 0:01:52.440 Yeah. Fair. 0:01:52.640 --> 0:01:55.920 Um, but in another sense, it does make other leaders 0:01:55.960 --> 0:01:59.880 ears prick up, because it's a country that China and 0:01:59.880 --> 0:02:04.000 Russia both want to extend their influence over. And there's 0:02:04.040 --> 0:02:06.480 a competition afoot, and Australia is on the other side 0:02:06.480 --> 0:02:09.800 of that competition. Obviously we want to we want to 0:02:09.800 --> 0:02:15.120 keep relations with Indonesia as solid as possible to protect 0:02:15.360 --> 0:02:19.120 not only only our economic, but also, critically, our strategic 0:02:19.120 --> 0:02:23.600 future and to prevent Indonesia falling too closely into the 0:02:23.600 --> 0:02:27.480 orbit of either China or Russia, which are obviously predator states. 0:02:27.880 --> 0:02:29.960 Russia just wants to throw its weight around and do 0:02:29.960 --> 0:02:32.960 as much damage as possible in the world. But China 0:02:32.960 --> 0:02:35.880 is larger, smarter and longer term and wants to dominate 0:02:35.880 --> 0:02:40.000 the world. So this is why Indonesia is such a 0:02:40.840 --> 0:02:46.880 vital threshold and swing state and it's tradition all during 0:02:46.880 --> 0:02:49.680 the Cold War, all during the post-war period and until 0:02:49.680 --> 0:02:54.920 now is to be a non-aligned nation. It was actually 0:02:54.919 --> 0:02:58.120 one of the co-founders with India of the Non-Aligned movement, 0:02:58.120 --> 0:03:00.359 which had its first meeting in the city of Bandung 0:03:00.639 --> 0:03:03.399 in Indonesia. and this was the group of countries that 0:03:03.400 --> 0:03:08.040 refused to take sides overtly with either the Americans or 0:03:08.040 --> 0:03:12.120 the Soviet Union, and they still see that as their 0:03:12.120 --> 0:03:15.200 central defining characteristic in the modern world. 0:03:15.200 --> 0:03:17.640 That's really interesting. I had never heard that before. And 0:03:17.639 --> 0:03:19.960 if this country is so important to us, obviously crucial 0:03:19.960 --> 0:03:21.880 to that is who's leading it. So can you please 0:03:21.880 --> 0:03:24.840 tell us about Indonesia's president Prabowo Subianto? 0:03:25.120 --> 0:03:31.360 Prabowo is, I think, an absolutely fascinating figure. For years, 0:03:31.360 --> 0:03:34.760 he was on an unofficial blacklist and refused permission to 0:03:34.800 --> 0:03:38.400 travel to Australia. The Americans being, you know, a little 0:03:38.440 --> 0:03:41.480 bit more obvious about things, actually put him on a 0:03:41.880 --> 0:03:45.080 blacklist and refused to give him a visa for many years. 0:03:45.960 --> 0:03:48.880 And now he's the president of the world's third most 0:03:48.880 --> 0:03:54.280 populous democracy. So what's happened? Um, he was born with 0:03:54.280 --> 0:04:00.320 Javanese royal blood in his veins. Was, uh, allowed to 0:04:00.360 --> 0:04:04.840 marry one of the daughters of the long ruling dictator 0:04:04.840 --> 0:04:10.200 of Indonesia. Suharto and Suharto, then made him the head 0:04:10.200 --> 0:04:14.240 of the special forces in Indonesia called Kopassus, which is 0:04:14.760 --> 0:04:18.159 at any time an important and powerful job. But for Suharto, 0:04:18.160 --> 0:04:22.400 he wanted Prabowo doing this job to be his political enforcer, 0:04:22.960 --> 0:04:27.799 to the point where Prabowo was suspected of and reported 0:04:27.800 --> 0:04:34.200 to have committed all sorts of human rights abuses, quashing dissidents, torturing, 0:04:34.200 --> 0:04:36.799 and all the rest of it to protect Suharto's regime. 0:04:36.800 --> 0:04:41.880 And that's the reason that ultimately he was banned from 0:04:41.880 --> 0:04:46.960 visiting Australia and the US. But in the meantime. I mean, 0:04:48.080 --> 0:04:51.440 here's an extraordinary anecdote that tells you a lot about this. 0:04:51.440 --> 0:04:55.039 This man, as the head of Indonesian special forces, as 0:04:55.040 --> 0:04:57.919 the Suharto regime is toppling and literally in its last days, 0:04:57.920 --> 0:05:00.560 it was the last 2 or 3 days it was 0:05:00.560 --> 0:05:03.839 reported that Prabowo went to see his father in law 0:05:03.839 --> 0:05:07.400 in the presidential palace, the Istana merdeka, which means a 0:05:07.440 --> 0:05:11.000 freedom palace in in Jakarta. But the fascinating detail is 0:05:11.000 --> 0:05:14.600 that the palace staff would not let Prabowo in to 0:05:14.640 --> 0:05:17.640 see his father in law, the dictator Suharto, until he 0:05:17.640 --> 0:05:21.239 removed his sidearm and they had an argument about it. Now, 0:05:21.279 --> 0:05:24.560 why would that be? Evidently, they feared that he was 0:05:24.560 --> 0:05:28.000 there not to consult or help his father in law, 0:05:28.120 --> 0:05:32.960 but to murder him and seize power through a coup. Wow. 0:05:33.000 --> 0:05:35.120 In the dying days of his father in law's regime. 0:05:35.120 --> 0:05:38.520 So this is paints a picture of a pretty ruthless 0:05:38.520 --> 0:05:43.040 and pretty opportunistic sort of character. After those years, Indonesia 0:05:43.080 --> 0:05:47.360 became democratic. Thank goodness for that. Prabowo had several cracks 0:05:47.360 --> 0:05:50.680 at the presidency until finally last year, he broke through 0:05:51.160 --> 0:05:55.800 not as a military strongman because he had campaigned rather colourfully, 0:05:55.800 --> 0:05:59.160 riding a white stallion. That's right. And giving these xenophobic 0:05:59.200 --> 0:06:02.750 tirades to mobs in arenas. And it was quite a 0:06:02.790 --> 0:06:05.550 quite a scene, but that didn't work for him. So 0:06:05.710 --> 0:06:09.270 at the last election, he, he transformed himself into what 0:06:09.270 --> 0:06:14.310 was called Cute grandpa. He adopted the Donald Trump dance moves. 0:06:15.029 --> 0:06:19.510 He went crazy on TikTok and a younger generation. And 0:06:19.510 --> 0:06:21.950 there's a huge number of Indonesia is a very young 0:06:21.950 --> 0:06:26.870 country demographically who didn't know about his years. And they 0:06:26.870 --> 0:06:32.429 were last century as this dangerous alleged human rights violator 0:06:32.790 --> 0:06:35.510 just fell in love with cute grandpa. And now he's president. 0:06:35.790 --> 0:06:38.470 And we know that when he was elected last year, 0:06:38.470 --> 0:06:41.430 he won in a landslide election victory. And it was 0:06:41.430 --> 0:06:43.909 with the backing of his predecessor, Joko Widodo, who I 0:06:43.910 --> 0:06:46.950 know we've spoken about. He was enormously popular, and I 0:06:46.950 --> 0:06:48.510 believe at the time he had said that he was 0:06:48.510 --> 0:06:52.110 going to carry on with, uh, jokowi's works. Like, what 0:06:52.150 --> 0:06:55.390 sort of president has he become after this really quite 0:06:55.430 --> 0:06:58.750 fascinating transformation? At least a fascinating one from the outside. 0:06:58.750 --> 0:07:00.350 I don't know what's happening on the inside. 0:07:00.390 --> 0:07:05.349 Yes. Well, one thing that he brought into into being 0:07:05.350 --> 0:07:09.110 was his central campaign promise to the people of Indonesia, 0:07:09.110 --> 0:07:13.630 which is a free daily meals program for every school 0:07:13.630 --> 0:07:17.390 pupil in the country and for nursing and pregnant mothers. 0:07:17.870 --> 0:07:21.470 And the idea was, firstly, it's obviously an anti-poverty measure 0:07:21.950 --> 0:07:26.150 because Indonesia was making solid gains against poverty until the 0:07:26.150 --> 0:07:29.670 Covid pandemic, which really set it back. And there's been 0:07:29.710 --> 0:07:32.670 a big rise in stunting of children's growth, which has 0:07:32.710 --> 0:07:35.710 become a real national scandal. So Prabowo said, I'm going 0:07:35.710 --> 0:07:38.990 to give free school meals and to and to mums, 0:07:39.030 --> 0:07:43.470 young mums, pregnant, pregnant and nursing mums to overcome this problem, 0:07:43.470 --> 0:07:46.910 which is more than 80 million people to get food 0:07:46.910 --> 0:07:51.230 to daily. But it's happening, it's happening, it's started, it's 0:07:51.270 --> 0:07:54.150 well advanced. But if you think about the scale of 0:07:54.150 --> 0:07:57.869 80 million people daily on a government handout of of 0:07:57.990 --> 0:08:01.150 food in a in a country that's made up of 0:08:01.950 --> 0:08:05.830 more than 10,000 islands. I mean, even just conducting an 0:08:05.830 --> 0:08:08.710 election there is difficult enough, much less a daily food program. 0:08:08.710 --> 0:08:13.750 It's extraordinary. The problem, the real problem with it is 0:08:13.750 --> 0:08:18.150 the cost. And this this has created all sorts of 0:08:18.270 --> 0:08:21.270 problems because they've cut funding for everything else to fund 0:08:21.310 --> 0:08:25.119 a thing. This program is nearly 30 billion USD, 50 0:08:25.120 --> 0:08:27.150 billion AUD a year. 0:08:27.270 --> 0:08:29.710 Well, this gets us to my next question, because you've 0:08:29.710 --> 0:08:32.510 written that he is enormously popular right now. But at 0:08:32.510 --> 0:08:36.510 the same time, you've written about nationwide protests against Prabowo. 0:08:36.550 --> 0:08:38.270 So tell us what sparked them. 0:08:38.309 --> 0:08:41.430 Yes, he is very popular, and partly it's because he's new. 0:08:41.470 --> 0:08:44.910 He only took power in October, and partly because this 0:08:44.910 --> 0:08:47.309 food program is what he promised. And it is a 0:08:47.309 --> 0:08:51.270 popular thing. But because they've had to cut money from 0:08:51.270 --> 0:08:55.670 a whole bunch of other areas of government outlay, it's 0:08:55.670 --> 0:08:58.590 it's created a big concern. And the protest movement that 0:08:58.590 --> 0:09:03.030 you've referenced, it's led by university students. The protest movement 0:09:03.030 --> 0:09:10.150 is called Dark Indonesia. And it's called Dark Indonesia. In 0:09:10.150 --> 0:09:14.429 juxtaposition to Prabowo's stated vision for the future of Indonesia, 0:09:14.670 --> 0:09:17.510 which he calls Golden Indonesia, and his vision of Golden 0:09:17.510 --> 0:09:20.429 Indonesia is to turn it into a fully developed country 0:09:20.830 --> 0:09:25.709 in 20 years a democratic, rich, powerful country in 20 years. 0:09:26.110 --> 0:09:29.070 But the student protesters have said no. What we see 0:09:29.110 --> 0:09:32.870 coming is dark Indonesia, and one of the the biggest 0:09:32.870 --> 0:09:36.310 reasons that they're on the streets, and this started in 0:09:36.309 --> 0:09:40.070 February and it's still rolling on sporadically, is the cuts 0:09:40.070 --> 0:09:44.949 to education funding, which affected both schools and universities. And 0:09:44.950 --> 0:09:49.950 the university protest movement is saying you, Prabowo, are trying 0:09:49.950 --> 0:09:54.429 to crush and extinguish education in this country and knowledge. 0:09:54.830 --> 0:09:57.790 But at the same time, we think you're making moves 0:09:58.230 --> 0:10:01.310 to restore the power of the military. And we fear 0:10:01.309 --> 0:10:04.470 that you're taking Indonesia back to being a military dictatorship. 0:10:07.110 --> 0:10:17.829 We'll be right back. Well, tell me about this, because 0:10:17.830 --> 0:10:20.390 we know that Prabowo's decision to widen the scope of 0:10:20.390 --> 0:10:23.550 the military's involvement in civilian affairs, it really has aroused 0:10:23.550 --> 0:10:25.870 deep fears within the country. Right. So tell us what 0:10:25.870 --> 0:10:26.790 he has done. 0:10:26.790 --> 0:10:31.069 Well, on the symbolic level. He gave his new cabinet 0:10:31.590 --> 0:10:34.150 a bit of a jolt at the beginning of the 0:10:34.150 --> 0:10:37.309 term by taking them all, making them wear combat fatigues 0:10:37.510 --> 0:10:39.950 and taking them all on a three day military boot camp. 0:10:40.990 --> 0:10:44.870 I don't know how the Australian cabinet would go if 0:10:44.870 --> 0:10:46.510 they were all put in fatigues and sent on a 0:10:46.510 --> 0:10:47.350 three day boot camp. 0:10:47.390 --> 0:10:49.790 I mean, that's kind of got XI Jinping vibes, doesn't it? 0:10:49.830 --> 0:10:54.070 It does. It's got tough guy, military, militaristic sort of vibes. 0:10:54.070 --> 0:10:57.110 But the more substantial stuff is, for example, the food 0:10:57.110 --> 0:11:01.069 program that we talked about, some of that is being 0:11:01.110 --> 0:11:04.150 carried out, the food delivered every day by the military. 0:11:04.429 --> 0:11:06.710 And the protest movement is saying, well, hang on, you 0:11:06.710 --> 0:11:10.390 shouldn't be using the military for civil duties like that. 0:11:10.710 --> 0:11:17.430 More troublingly, though, is his, uh, he has created a 0:11:17.470 --> 0:11:21.710 law to open up more civilian jobs at senior levels 0:11:21.710 --> 0:11:25.430 in the government, to the army, to active duty military officers. Now, 0:11:25.470 --> 0:11:28.510 that was that was the case under Suharto. One of 0:11:28.510 --> 0:11:31.190 the Post-suharto reforms was to stop that, to put in 0:11:31.190 --> 0:11:33.550 place a bunch of guardrails, of which this is an 0:11:33.550 --> 0:11:37.390 important one, to stop the military coming back into power 0:11:37.950 --> 0:11:41.110 and running the country. So the concern is that this 0:11:41.110 --> 0:11:45.110 is the thin edge of the wedge, and that he's 0:11:45.110 --> 0:11:47.830 going to continue to reinstall the military at the heart 0:11:47.830 --> 0:11:48.709 of the government. 0:11:48.710 --> 0:11:50.670 And it is scary, isn't it? I think I read somewhere, 0:11:50.710 --> 0:11:53.030 probably in your piece that, you know, in doing so, 0:11:53.070 --> 0:11:56.429 in clearing the way for military officers to fill civilian positions, 0:11:56.429 --> 0:11:58.590 we're talking about, you know, for instance, positions in the 0:11:58.590 --> 0:12:01.470 attorney general's office. I mean, that's clearly something of a 0:12:01.470 --> 0:12:04.750 terrifying proposition if the country or others are concerned about. 0:12:04.750 --> 0:12:08.470 Some backslide into the days of Suharto and dictatorship. 0:12:08.910 --> 0:12:13.790 Yes. And that fear is really at the center of 0:12:14.270 --> 0:12:18.510 Indonesia's consciousness is that, you know, we are we are 0:12:18.510 --> 0:12:22.950 still a fairly fresh democracy. We are a young country, 0:12:22.950 --> 0:12:30.790 and we haven't yet really cemented our democratic structures, natures 0:12:30.990 --> 0:12:34.589 and habits. So they're very sensitive to it. And look 0:12:34.590 --> 0:12:39.190 around the world. We're into an era of tough guy 0:12:39.230 --> 0:12:43.830 dictators and would be dictators and autocrats. So it's it's 0:12:43.870 --> 0:12:48.510 a it's a reasonable fear. There's also been a resurgence 0:12:48.510 --> 0:12:53.550 of the traditional Indonesian problem of corruption under Prabowo. The, 0:12:53.830 --> 0:12:57.830 the major media organization in Indonesia named tempo, has been 0:12:57.830 --> 0:13:02.750 doing lots of investigative reporting, showing that, among other things, 0:13:03.470 --> 0:13:09.790 Prabowo's family and cronies are in in powerful positions controlling 0:13:09.790 --> 0:13:13.630 the food program rollout and and other programs. 0:13:13.750 --> 0:13:16.430 Well, I guess this brings us back to Albaneses trip 0:13:16.429 --> 0:13:19.470 to Indonesia. So do we know what our Prime Minister 0:13:19.470 --> 0:13:22.430 has spoken to Prabowo about, or still plans to speak 0:13:22.429 --> 0:13:24.630 to him about? Do we know what the goal with 0:13:24.630 --> 0:13:27.870 this visit is, and how much Albanese is likely to achieve? 0:13:27.910 --> 0:13:30.110 Well, we know what they've talked about. On the initial 0:13:30.110 --> 0:13:35.150 phone call, when Prabowo phoned Albanese to congratulate him on 0:13:35.150 --> 0:13:41.510 his re-election as prime minister because without Albanese knowing, Prabowo 0:13:41.550 --> 0:13:43.990 filmed it and put it put the video up in 0:13:43.990 --> 0:13:47.270 public for everybody to see, which was pretty funny. 0:13:48.830 --> 0:13:53.350 I like to congratulate you on your great victory. I 0:13:53.350 --> 0:13:57.030 was so happy. I was so happy. I was so happy. 0:13:58.950 --> 0:14:01.670 I want Indonesia to be my first visit. 0:14:01.790 --> 0:14:07.590 Great honor, great honor. Good. Yes. Yes, yes. 0:14:07.750 --> 0:14:09.150 It's an unbreakable. 0:14:09.150 --> 0:14:10.270 Bond. Right, right, right. 0:14:10.309 --> 0:14:13.870 So Albanese was shocked when his staff told him. Hey, 0:14:13.870 --> 0:14:14.470 did you know? 0:14:14.550 --> 0:14:15.830 And why would he have done that? What was the 0:14:15.870 --> 0:14:16.910 goal there from Prabowo? 0:14:17.070 --> 0:14:20.150 He likes to show himself off to the Indonesian people 0:14:20.470 --> 0:14:23.390 as being a big man, a guy that other leaders 0:14:23.390 --> 0:14:26.910 want to talk to. Fortunately for Albanese, it was just 0:14:26.910 --> 0:14:31.190 a pretty backslapping, convivial phone call. Yeah, there was a 0:14:31.190 --> 0:14:35.790 slight twinge of embarrassment because it caught Albanese saying to Prabowo, now, 0:14:36.190 --> 0:14:38.270 can I come to Indonesia? Do you want to invite me? 0:14:38.310 --> 0:14:42.110 Rather than waiting to be invited? But Prabowo said, oh, 0:14:42.150 --> 0:14:44.590 of course, you know. And they do have a good, 0:14:44.910 --> 0:14:51.470 good personal relationship. Those two on the agenda are a 0:14:51.510 --> 0:14:56.590 few things. What Prabowo wants most of all is what 0:14:56.590 --> 0:15:00.230 his predecessor wanted. Most of all, Jokowi also wanted to 0:15:00.270 --> 0:15:05.510 get Indonesia out of the middle income trap. so-called, and 0:15:05.510 --> 0:15:07.030 make it get it on the path to being a 0:15:07.030 --> 0:15:11.110 wealthy country. That's their primary aim. And so Albanese goes 0:15:11.110 --> 0:15:14.390 there to talk to, and I did ask Albanese about 0:15:14.390 --> 0:15:18.430 this before he travelled, actually. Uh, Albanese is going there 0:15:18.430 --> 0:15:22.430 to talk principally about trade and investment and the economic relationship. 0:15:22.830 --> 0:15:25.510 And that's smart because it's what Prabowo most wants. It's 0:15:25.510 --> 0:15:28.950 also the times, because of the Trump disruption to global trade, 0:15:28.950 --> 0:15:31.630 but overshadowing all of that. And I'm not sure how 0:15:31.630 --> 0:15:34.710 blatantly they'll talk about it, is the China and Russia 0:15:34.750 --> 0:15:39.230 factor and the fact that they want to win Indonesia 0:15:39.270 --> 0:15:43.550 over to to their team, to the predator Predators team 0:15:44.070 --> 0:15:45.630 against Australia's interests. 0:15:45.830 --> 0:15:47.430 Okay. But then we've got the news just in the 0:15:47.430 --> 0:15:49.470 last couple of days that China and the US have 0:15:49.470 --> 0:15:52.350 de-escalated their trade war. They've both dropped a lot of 0:15:52.390 --> 0:15:54.390 the tariffs that they'd put on each other. So does 0:15:54.390 --> 0:15:57.270 that change the calculations of how much we need Indonesia 0:15:57.310 --> 0:15:59.550 I guess for for trade or not. Like what impact 0:15:59.550 --> 0:16:00.430 does that have on us? 0:16:00.470 --> 0:16:03.950 Well, it's helpful if the tariff war between the US 0:16:03.950 --> 0:16:07.380 and China doesn't occur. It's helpful for everybody in the 0:16:07.380 --> 0:16:10.340 world because it's one of the world's biggest two way 0:16:10.380 --> 0:16:14.100 trade flows. And to to cut it off. And those 0:16:14.100 --> 0:16:18.740 tariffs were so punitively eye wateringly high that effectively it 0:16:18.740 --> 0:16:21.540 was going to kill just about all trade between the 0:16:21.540 --> 0:16:24.740 US and China. So for that not to happen is 0:16:24.740 --> 0:16:27.380 a positive for the world economy, because it was expected 0:16:27.380 --> 0:16:31.500 to send the world economy into a downturn and the 0:16:31.500 --> 0:16:35.740 US into recession, and China's already struggling to maintain its growth. 0:16:35.780 --> 0:16:40.580 It's it's in economic trouble. But that global effect is 0:16:40.580 --> 0:16:43.500 what would have hurt Australia most. If that's not happening, 0:16:43.500 --> 0:16:46.860 that's a good thing. However, the the Tony and 90 0:16:46.900 --> 0:16:50.940 day suspension of the US-China tariffs on each other while 0:16:50.940 --> 0:16:53.820 they try to negotiate something. And so far, Trump has 0:16:53.820 --> 0:16:57.580 failed to successfully negotiate any of the things that he promised. 0:16:57.580 --> 0:17:01.100 So in that in that circumstance, yes, Australia in fact, 0:17:01.140 --> 0:17:04.700 government position for years in multiple prime ministers has been. 0:17:05.300 --> 0:17:09.540 This trade relationship with Indonesia is really undercooked. It's a 0:17:09.540 --> 0:17:12.540 tiny amount of of trade relative to the size of 0:17:12.540 --> 0:17:15.899 the two economies. We need to do more. And there's 0:17:15.900 --> 0:17:18.860 a strategy for that. Government's been pursuing for a couple 0:17:18.900 --> 0:17:24.540 of years. It hasn't really produced much of value. But 0:17:24.540 --> 0:17:27.820 this is a new opportunity. Partly thanks to Donald Trump 0:17:28.619 --> 0:17:31.420 to revive or to at least create a larger two 0:17:31.420 --> 0:17:32.260 way trade flow. 0:17:32.780 --> 0:17:34.700 Okay, Peter, so just to wrap up, I did want 0:17:34.740 --> 0:17:37.340 to ask you, you know, there's fears within Indonesia and 0:17:37.380 --> 0:17:39.540 I guess outside of it as well, that Prabowo is 0:17:39.540 --> 0:17:44.900 eroding freedoms, perhaps even veering into authoritarianism. Does that lead 0:17:44.900 --> 0:17:47.940 this to be something dangerous politically for Albanese to increase 0:17:47.940 --> 0:17:49.780 trade with such a regime? 0:17:50.060 --> 0:17:53.460 I suppose it's always a risk. But, you know, Samantha, 0:17:53.460 --> 0:17:59.460 we've had no trouble expanding trade with autocrats. China is 0:17:59.460 --> 0:18:03.859 our largest trading partner. Vietnam is another. And the government 0:18:03.859 --> 0:18:07.660 has been working hard to increase trade and political relations 0:18:07.660 --> 0:18:11.260 with Vietnam. So really, the reason that Albanese wants to 0:18:11.580 --> 0:18:15.420 improve the trading and general relationship is first to directly 0:18:15.420 --> 0:18:18.500 advance Australia's interests in the short run, but second, to 0:18:18.500 --> 0:18:23.020 help Indonesia grow into the mode of a prosperous democratic 0:18:23.020 --> 0:18:26.820 nation and not to be captured by the fears that 0:18:26.820 --> 0:18:29.980 the protesters in the dark Indonesia movement are imagining. 0:18:29.980 --> 0:18:32.260 So perhaps even help in some way to protect the 0:18:32.260 --> 0:18:35.100 country from going to becoming a dictatorship. 0:18:35.140 --> 0:18:42.220 Exactly. To give Jakarta choices. To give it options. So 0:18:42.220 --> 0:18:44.940 that it doesn't see its future tied up only with 0:18:44.940 --> 0:18:49.659 China or only with Russia, and that it continues to 0:18:49.700 --> 0:18:53.780 have its options open and to cooperate with Australia. Australia 0:18:53.820 --> 0:18:58.139 signed its first really significant defence cooperation agreement with Indonesia 0:18:58.140 --> 0:19:02.580 just last year under Jokowi. So to keep those options 0:19:02.580 --> 0:19:06.380 open so it doesn't become captive of a dictatorship to 0:19:06.420 --> 0:19:09.380 the north is a critical equity for Australia, and that's 0:19:09.380 --> 0:19:11.500 the overarching aim of what Albanese is doing. 0:19:12.980 --> 0:19:15.100 Well, thank you so much, Peter. As always. 0:19:15.100 --> 0:19:15.940 A pleasure, Samantha. 0:19:15.940 --> 0:19:23.980 For your time. Today's episode of The Morning Edition was 0:19:23.980 --> 0:19:27.780 produced by myself and Josh towers. Our executive producer is 0:19:27.780 --> 0:19:31.419 Tammy Mills. Tom McKendrick is our head of audio. To 0:19:31.460 --> 0:19:34.300 listen to our episodes as soon as they drop, follow 0:19:34.300 --> 0:19:37.660 the Morning Edition on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen 0:19:37.660 --> 0:19:41.859 to podcasts. Our newsrooms are powered by subscriptions, so to 0:19:41.859 --> 0:19:48.580 support independent journalism, visit The Age or smh.com.au. Subscribe and 0:19:48.580 --> 0:19:50.859 to stay up to date, sign up to our Morningedition 0:19:50.859 --> 0:19:53.540 newsletter to receive a summary of the day's most important 0:19:53.580 --> 0:19:57.980 news in your inbox every morning. Links are in the show. Notes. 0:19:58.340 --> 0:20:01.459 I'm Samantha Selinger. Morris. Thanks for listening.