Reformist military men helped Indonesia’s democracy. Why not in Myanmar?

When a survey of 1,200 people by Indonesian pollster Indikator Politik this month showed that Indonesia’s military, known by the acronym TNI, was the most trusted institution in Southeast Asia’s largest economy – even relegating President Joko Widodo to second place – military observers had a ready answer for why this was so.

And indeed, the beginnings of Indonesia’s democratic transition, known as Reformasi, after former dictator Suharto’s resignation in 1998, were fraught with turmoil. Suharto, an army general who took power in the late 1960s, was toppled by mass protests, widespread civil strife and the crippling Asian Financial Crisis which left millions out of work. The subsequent years were marked by sectarian violence and a rise in separatist insurgencies across the multicultural country made up of more than 17,000 islands.

Zachary Abuza, professor of Southeast Asia Studies at the National War College in the United States, highlighted how then-Armed Forces chief and Defence Minister General Wiranto, whom Indonesians saw as the country’s most powerful man, could have easily staged a coup amid the violence and chaos of 1998 and 1999.